Gulp: Adventures on the Alimentary Canal
By Mary Roach
(Norton, $26.95, 352 pages)
Who is this author?
“Stiff.” “Bonk.” “Spook.” “Gulp.” Mary Roach (and what a great name for a science writer!) has an ear for the punchy one-word title, adding edifying subtitles to explain what the book is actually about.
Born in Hanover, N.H. and a 1981 graduate of Wesleyan University, Roach made her career in California, where she still lives, writing about hard and often weird science with a distinctively humorous approach. I can recall, in my days as the Health & Science page editor at The Courant, that pieces by Roach were hard to beat for explaining the difficult in a delightfully funny, yet accurate, way. Her other books include “Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers,” “Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife,” “Packing for Mars: The Curious Science of Life in the Void” and “Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex,” for which Roach and her remarkably helpful husband volunteered for some interesting research experimentation.
What is this book about?
It’s alimentary, my dear Watson. (OK, sorry, I couldn’t resist.)
In “Gulp,” Roach takes us on a wild ride through the human gut, employing her agile mind and endless curiosity to probe the human piping system that keeps us nourished properly and eliminating nicely. Sometimes gross and gruesome, but also fascinating and funny, this is a book that will stimulate your mind and answers some questions that the 5-year-old in each of us still wonders about: how come the stomach doesn’t digest itself? Can you eat so much that it will burst, like that fat guy in the Monty Python movie? Does pet food taste the same to a dog and his owner? Did constipation kill Elvis? Well, did it? It’s all there, and more, in a book that you can savor in small bites or greedily gulp down.
Why you’ll like it:
Roach is a thorough researcher, a smart analyst and a damn amusing writer, all real pluses when you are writing about science for a general and generally mystified audience. Asked by NPR how she chooses her subjects, Roach said: “Well, it’s got to have a little science, it’s got to have a little history, a little humor – and something gross.”
She is careful to explain how she did her research and introduce various scientists who are important in the fields she explores.
She told an interviewer: “Make no mistake, good science writing is medicine. It is a cure for ignorance and fallacy. Good science writing peels away the blindness, generates wonder, and brings the open palm to the forehead: ‘Oh! Now I get it!’”
What others are saying:
Barnes & Noble says: “Mary Roach has been described as “America’s funniest science writer,” not a superlative that one would expect that an author on a book about human cadavers would receive. In her latest effort, the author of “Stiff” and “Packing for Mars” takes us on an incredible voyage down our gullets and into dark digestive regions where more timid observers dare not go. Thanks to her apparently unflagging curiosity, Roach is willing to ask and answer essential questions, like …”How long can an oyster live inside us?” Simply put, “Gulp” will make you gasp with delight.”
“ ‘Gulp’ is far and away her funniest and most sparkling book, bringing Ms. Roach’s love of weird science to material that could not have more everyday relevance. Having graduated from corpses (“Stiff”), the afterlife (“Spook”) and sex (“Bonk,” full of stunts featuring Ms. Roach as guinea pig), she takes on a subject wholly mainstream. She explores it with unalloyed merriment. And she is fearless about the embarrassment that usually accompanies it…Never has Ms. Roach’s affinity for the comedic and bizarre been put to better use,” says Janet Maslin in The New York Times.
The Washington Post says: “…[Roach is] a very good writer who understands that her job is, above all, to entertain. Every paragraph is a pleasure to read, even if that paragraph is about a partially decomposed gazelle entombed in the body of a python…In the wrong hands, a book on digestion would be rendered tedious by a need to cover every aspect of the subject to some degree. But Roach follows her interests, not a checklist…you’ll come away from this well-researched book with enough weird digestive trivia to make you the most interesting guest at a certain kind of cocktail party.”
“Roach…once again goes boldly into the fields of strange science. In the case of her newest, some may hesitate to follow—it’s about the human digestive system, and it’s as gross as one might expect. But it’s also enthralling. From mouth to gut to butt, Roach is unflinching as she charts every crevice and quirk of the alimentary canal—a voyage she cheerily likens to “a cruise along the Rhine.” En route, she comments on everything from the microbial wisdom of ancient China, to the tactics employed by prisoners when smuggling contraband in their alimentary “vaults,” the surprising success rate of fecal transplants, how conducting a colonoscopy is a little like “playing an accordion,” and a perhaps too-good-to-be-true tale in the New York Times in 1896 of a real-life Jonah surviving a 36-hour stint in the belly of a sperm whale. Roach’s approach is grounded in science, but the virtuosic author rarely resists a pun, and it’s clear she revels in giving readers a thrill—even if it is a queasy one. Adventurous kids and doctors alike will appreciate this fascinating and sometimes ghastly tour of the gastrointestinal system, says Publishers Weekly.
“…. The author ties her curiosity about this region of the body and what many consider a disgusting or off-limits subject for polite conversation to a fifth-grade classroom encounter with a headless, limbless, molded-plastic torso: “Function was not hinted at in Mrs. Claflin’s educational torso man….Yet I owe the guy a debt of thanks. To venture beyond the abdominal wall, even a plastic one, was to pull back the curtain on life itself.” The author begins by detailing the subtle, complex role the nose plays in taste; why humans have trouble finding names for flavors and smells;… grapples with the history of flatulence and adeptly describes the torment caused by Elvis Presley’s megacolon, which ultimately caused his demise. She also fleshes out just what constitutes the “ick factor” in this tale of ingestion, digestion and elimination. Roach’s abundant footnotes serve as entertaining detours throughout this edifying excursion. When a topic heads toward sketchy territory, the author politely provides a heads-up for squeamish readers. ….A touchy topic illuminated with wit and rigor, packed with all the stinky details, “ says Kirkus Reviews.
When is it available?
You can gulp this book down at the new books shelf of the Downtown Hartford Public Library.
Do you have something to say about this book, this author or books in general? Please post your comments here and I will respond. Let’s get a good books conversation going!
Bunker Hill: A City, a Siege, a Revolution,
By Nathaniel Philbrick
(Viking, $32.95, 416 pages)
Who is this author?
Nathaniel Philbrick was born in Boston and knows the city and its early history quite well. Now a resident of Nantucket, he is the New York Times bestselling author of the National Book Award winner “In the Heart of the Sea” and was a Pulitzer Prize finalist for “Mayflower,” “Sea of Glory” and “The Last Stand.” Philbrick also wrote “Why Read Moby-Dick?” and “Away Off Shore.”
What is this book about?
With the appalling terrorist bombing on Patriot’s Day fresh in our minds, we’ve all been thinking about Boston lately. For historian and author Nathaniel Philbrick, Boston and its environs is constantly something worth thinking about. An authority on the Colonial and Revolutionary periods of American history, Philbrick here rescues the story of the Battle of Bunker Hill from its hoary layers of historical embellishments and mythmaking and tells us what really happened that day in 1775, following the 1773 dumping of tea in Boston Harbor – the original Tea Party – and the clashes at Lexington and Concord. The Bunker Hill battle, Philbrick says, was the true harbinger of the Revolutionary War and all that came after. In that battle, major players emerged, including a doctor named Joseph Warren who led the Patriot militia, Paul Revere, the poet Mercy Scollay, George Washington and British generals Thomas Gage and William Howe.
In his preface to the book, Philbrick writes:
“…I have been exploring these places, trying to get a fix on the long-lost topography that is essential to understanding how Boston’s former residents interacted. Boston in the 1770s was a land-connected island with a population of about fifteen thousand, all of whom probably recognized, if not knew, each other. Being myself a resident of an island with a year-round population very close in size to provincial Boston’s, I have some familiarity with how petty feuds, family alliances, professional jealousies, and bonds of friendship can transform a local controversy into a supercharged outpouring of communal angst. The issues are real enough, but why we find ourselves on one side or the other of those issues is often unclear even to us. Things just happen in a way that has little to do with logic or rationality and everything to do with the mysterious and infinitely complex ways that human beings respond to one another.
“In the beginning there were three different colonial groups in Massachusetts. One group was aligned with those who eventually became revolutionaries. For lack of a better word, I will call these people “patriots.” Another group remained faithful to the crown, and they appear herein as “loyalists.” Those in the third and perhaps largest group were not sure where they stood. Part of what makes a revolution such a fascinating subject to study is the arrival of the moment when neutrality is no longer an option. Like it or not, a person has to choose.”
Why you’ll like it:
For many readers, the most important part of “history” is “story,” and Philbrick has the gift of bringing complex and misreported or misunderstood events into a narrative that holds our interest. He does this by telling it through the experiences of real people, which gives the book a vivid immediacy that blows off the cobwebs. If you cannot recall what you learned about Bunker Hill all those years ago in school, or if you don’t feel you ever were taught the complete story, this book is for you.
What others are saying:
Barnes & Noble says: “In popular culture, the Battle of Bunker Hill has lived on mostly as a trick question: Where was the Battle of Bunker Hill fought? (The military confrontation that fully ignited the American Revolution occurred mostly on Breed’s Hill.) National Book Award winner Nathaniel Philbrick …rescues this pivotal epoch in our history with a revelatory narrative about the full context and unfolding of the bloodiest battle in the War for Independence. Seeing patriots and warriors so clearly that you can see the whites of their eyes.”
Says Publishers Weekly: “Like most popular historians, Philbrick …writes about discrete events, not large developments. And he’s good at it, even if the larger context is rarely considered and critical analysis gives way to story and celebration. Here, his focus is on events that began with the humiliations of the British at Lexington and Concord and ended with the siege of Boston, the American victory at Bunker Hill in 1775, and the departure in 1776 of British forces from New England’s largest city. Philbrick correctly presents the battle at Bunker Hill as a critical moment in the opening stages of the War for Independence, and displays an empathy for the out-maneuvered British caught in the traps that the Patriots laid for them. He wisely makes as one of his central figures the Patriots’ charismatic leader, Joseph Warren, who was killed at Bunker Hill, and who has since been largely forgotten, despite having been the man responsible for “orchestrating the on-the-ground reality of a revolution.” Philbrick tells his tale in traditional fashion—briskly, colorfully, and with immediacy. The book would have benefited from a point of view more firmly grounded in a contemporary evaluation of the battle, but even as it is—no one has told this tale better.”
“National Book Award winner and Pulitzer Prize finalist Philbrick ….will be a candidate for another award with this ingenious, bottom-up look at Boston from the time of the December 1773 Tea Party to the iconic June 1775 battle. Independence Day rhetoric extols our forefathers’ battle for freedom against tyranny and unfair taxation, but the author points out that American colonists were the freest, most-prosperous and least-taxed subjects of the British Empire and perhaps the world. A century and a half of London’s salutary neglect had resulted in 13 nearly independent colonies. Trouble began in the 1760s when Parliament attempted to tax them to help pay for the ruinously expensive victory in the French and Indian War. Unexpected opposition handled with spectacular clumsiness by Britain guaranteed trouble. Among Massachusetts’ resistance leaders, most readers know John Hancock and Samuel Adams, but Philbrick concentrates on Joseph Warren, a charismatic young physician, unjustly neglected today since he died at Bunker Hill. His opposite number, British Gen. Thomas Gage, behaved with remarkable restraint. Despite warnings that it would take massive reinforcements to keep the peace, superiors in London goaded him into action, resulting in the disastrous April 1775 expedition to Lexington and Concord. They also sent a more pugnacious general, William Howe, who decided to expel colonial militias, now besieging Boston, by an uphill frontal attack on their entrenched lines, a foolish tactic. British forces succeeded but suffered massive casualties. It was the first and bloodiest engagement of the eight years of fighting that followed. A rewarding approach to a well-worn subject, rich in anecdotes, opinion, bloodshed and Byzantine political maneuvering,” says Kirkus Reviews.
When is it available?
It’s now on the new books shelf at the Downtown Hartford Public Library.
Do you have something to say about this book, this author or books in general? Please post your comments here and I will respond. Let’s get a good books conversation going!
The Interestings
By Meg Wolitzer
(Penguin, $27.95, 480 pages)
Who is this author?
Meg Wolitzer, a bestselling author who writes smart, funny and incisive novels about women’s lives, is the daughter of author Hilma Wolitzer, who writes novels in a similar vein. Meg’s previous novels include “The Wife,” “The Position,” “Surrender, Dorothy,” “The Ten-Year Nap” and “The Uncoupling.” Wolitzer also has written screenplays and has been anthologized in “The Best American Short Stories” and has taught at the University of Iowa Writers’ Workshop and at Skidmore College. She was born in Brooklyn, graduated from Brown University and now lives in New York City.
Here’s some of what she told a Barnes & Noble interviewer:
“First of all, I am obsessed with playing Scrabble. It relaxes me between fits of writing, and I play online, in a bizarro world of anonymous, competitive players. It’s my version of smoking or drinking — a guilty pleasure. The thing is, I love words, anagrams, wordplay, cryptic crossword puzzles, and anything to do with the language.”
“But mostly, writing a powerful novel — whether funny or serious, or of course both — is my primary goal. When I hear that readers have been affected by something I’ve written, it’s a relief. I finally have come to no longer fear that I’m going to have to go to law school someday….”
What is this book about?
Every school or summer camp has its “kool kidz,” and Wolitzer’s novel follows six such adolescents into adulthood. Calling themselves “The Interestings,’ this group of artistically talented campers carry their hopes and flaws with them into middle age, and their story spans about 40 years, from the early 70s to today. Some pursue music or acting, some give up on the artistic life and others unexpectedly grow rich. But they remain friends – or frenemies – despite a divergence of fortune and the acid of envy — and it is their interactions that Wolitzer skillfully chronicles.
Why you’ll like it:
Wolitzer has a real grasp of how friendships and other relationships work, particularly for women. Her books have dealt with families that fall apart, the effects of a death on the survivors, the difficulties of maintaining a long-term friendship and the realities of realizing that one’s great expectations have turned out to be not so, well, great. Women readers in particular appreciate her explorations of the connections that make life rewarding or frustrating, and this book is a prime example of how she wisely handles this kind of story.
What others are saying:
Publishers Weekly says: “In the “nefarious, thoroughly repulsive” summer of 1974, 15-year-old Julie Jacobson, “an outsider and possibly even a freak” from the suburbs, gets a scholarship to an arts camp and falls in with a group of kids—the aptly self-named “Interestings.” Talented, attractive, and from New York City, to Julie they are “like royalty and French movie stars.” There Julie, renamed Jules, finds her place, and Wolitzer her story: the gap between promise and genuine talent, the bonds and strains of long friendships, and the journey from youth to middle age, with all its compromises, secrets, lies, and disparities…”
“ ‘The Interestings’ is exactly the kind of book that literary sorts who talk about ambitious works (at least in the nonexperimental vein) are talking about: It’s fat with pages and plot and loaded with thinly veiled cultural references, relevant social commentary and emotional themes particularly envy and regret. . . . “The Interestings” kept me in a state of alert recognition of the self, sometimes delighted and often chagrined. Wolitzer is almost crushingly insightful; she doesn’t just mine the contemporary mind, she seems to invade it,” says the San Francisco Chronicle.
Says Kirkus Reviews: “Wolitzer follows a group of friends from adolescence at an artsy summer camp in 1974 through adulthood and into late-middle age as their lives alternately intersect, diverge and reconnect. Middle-class suburban Julie becomes Jules when a group of more sophisticated kids from Manhattan include her in their clique… Her lifelong best friend becomes beautiful Ash, an aspiring actress. Ash’s older brother is sexy bad-boy Goodman. Cathy, who wants to dance, becomes Goodman’s girlfriend. Jonah, the ethereally handsome, slightly withdrawn son of a famous folksinger, is musically gifted. And then there is Ethan: homely, funny and a brilliant cartoonist. Although he and Jules are immediately soul mates, she rejects his physical advances, unable to work up any sexual attraction. After this first idyllic summer, the novel cuts to 2009 when Jules, now living a modest middle-class life as a therapist married to a medical technician, receives her annual Christmas letter from Ethan and Ash, who are married and wildly successful. As she looks back, the reader follows the evolution of the group. …. Secrets are kept for decades among the six “Interestings”; resentments are nursed; loyalties are tested with mixed results. Ambitious and involving, capturing the zeitgeist of the liberal intelligentsia of the era.
“Wolitzer’s latest novel follows a group of creative types from the beginning of their friendship as teenagers through middle age. Hipsters before their time, they dub themselves The Interestings, in an effort at pretentious irony, with only group member Julie Jacobson truly believing that they are quite interesting. …VERDICT The novel skips back and forth, revealing information about each member of the group and covering their triumphs and tragedies over the course of the years. Ultimately, the work hits its own ironic note: Julie’s successful and creative friends are far more normal than she’d ever realized. This is certain to attract readers of literary and smart women’s fiction,” says Library Journal.
When is it available?
This interesting book can be found at the Downtown Hartford Public Library and its Blue Hills and Mark Twain branches.
Do you have something to say about this book, this author or books in general? Please post your comments here and I will respond. Let’s get a good books conversation going!
American Story: A Lifetime Search for Ordinary People Doing Extraordinary Things
by Bob Dotson
(Viking, $26.95, 256 pages)
Who is this author?
If you are a fan of NBC’s “Today Show,” you are familiar with Bob Dotson, the NBC News correspondent, whose “American Story with Bob Dotson” is a regular feature there and on other NBC News programs and has won more than 100 broadcast journalism awards. He also wrote and hosted “Bob Dotson’s America” on the Travel Channel. Dotson lives in New York City and Mystic.
What is this book about?
Ordinary citizens making a difference – that’s a staple of media news features, in print or on the air – and such stories never fail to make readers (or viewers) feel good about America. For example, in the recent horrific bombings in Boston, reports of people going out of their way to help the injured and identify the bombers brought a ray of hope into that darkness.
Bob Dotson understands this dynamic and his book, which reflects more than 40 years of reporting such inspirational stories, celebrates the ideas and actions of good-hearted people who stepped up to help others. They include a boss who “un-retired” to found a new business when his former employees could not find new jobs, the doctor who developed the vaccine for whooping cough and kept on practicing till age 104, a truck driver who designs tools used in microsurgery, an Oregon sawmill owner who gave scholarships to seniors who wanted to attend college and many, many more.
Why you’ll like it:
In these days of vicious political partisanship, natural and man-made disasters and the endless outpouring of angry commentary in the social media, we could all use some stories that remind us of the essential goodness of most Americans. Dotson’s tales are brief, but compelling, told in an easy-to-read style and with heart. This book serves as antidote to the despair many feel about where the nation is heading.
What others are saying:
Publishers Weekly says: “In this powerful collection, NBC News correspondent Dotson compiles dozens of the human interest stories featured on his segment of the Today show….He’s traveled the country for decades interviewing remarkable people, many of whom have overcome great adversity and are actively working to make the world a better place for others. Some are quintessential innovators, like Jimmy Crudup, the truck driver who designs microsurgery tools on the side. Others defy the odds: in 1928, Leila Denmark became Atlanta’s first female pediatrician, and when she retired at the age of 103, she was the world’s oldest practicing doctor. (She died in 2012 at 114 years of age.) Elma Sneddeker’s tale is nothing if not miraculous: she was pulled from her burning car by a man born without arms who shattered a window with his foot to rescue her. Throughout, Dotson interweaves trying episodes from his own life, from being stricken with polio as a young boy to his decision to quit hard news and “look for people who offered solutions to problems that didn’t require bullets.” The details of their stories are unique, but their effect is not—they all inspire.”
“We’ve always known in our heart of hearts that the best of the country was bottom-up, not top-down, and now Bob Dotson, with this superb new book, proves us right. These are remarkable and poignant and important stories that need to be told,” says documentary filmmaker Ken Burns.
Says Kirkus Reviews: “The longtime Today Show correspondent offers a collection of heartwarming stories about ordinary citizens, “people who live the values our country cherishes.” For more than three decades now, Dotson …has specialized in Charles Kuralt–like stories about people “whose values were never preached, just lived.” Thus, we learn about the photographer whose 10-year project memorializing the giant cedars of western Washington led to the creation of Lewis and Clark National Park; the physician who recruited other retired doctors and nurses to establish a health clinic for the poor on Hilton Head Island; the first African-American in the U.S. Navy to earn a rank that took him out of the galley; the New York artist who traveled the country, exchanging his paintings for room and board. Dotson has found the last living member of Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show, the migrant mother captured forever in Dorothea Lange’s iconic photo and a Ziegfeld Follies chorus girl, still dancing at 105. The author mixes in a little autobiographical information, but he focuses on a succession of quiet achievers, people whose imagination, grit and goodness might otherwise have escaped the news, had he not gone in search of their stories. Many of the characters require more than the three or four pages Dotson allots them to make any lasting impression, but the sheer multitude of tales underscores his argument about an America chock-full of unassuming people whose lives enrich the nation.”
“Throughout his remarkable career Bob Dotson has searched for the real essence of America–not by interviewing the so-called famous, but by seeking out those unnoticed people we pass by every day. Those quiet souls are the ones who ‘live up to the brag,’ as he puts it, and remind us what truly makes this country great. Every story they tell is a jewel…and Dotson a national treasure for caring enough to listen,” says TV journalist and host Meredith Vieira.
When is it available?
You can search for “American Story” on the new books shelf at the Downtown Hartford Public Library.
Do you have something to say about this book, this author or books in general? Please post your comments here and I will respond. Let’s get a good books conversation going!
Life After Life
By Kate Atkinson
(Reagan Arthur, $27.99, 544 pages
Who is this author?
Kate Atkinson, who lives in Scotland, won the Whitbread (now called the Costa) Book of the Year Award for her first novel, “Behind the Scenes at the Museum,” and became a bestselling author who has more than one million copies of her books in print in the United States alone. Even the titles of her novels are intriguing, such as “Human Croquet,” “Emotionally Weird,” “When Will There Be Good News?” and “Started Early, Took My Dog.” Her novel “Case Histories,” which featured private investigator Jackson Brodie, became a TV series. She also has written a story collection, “Not the End of the World.”
What is this book about?
When you start with a fascinating premise, you immediately hook the reader. And this book has one. Its heroine, Ursula Todd, is born in winter 1910 and immediately dies. And then she is born again, in 1910, lives longer, and dies again as a child. It seems that Ursula will keep on doing this until she gets it right, like a cat with infinite lives that learns things from each life that matter in the next one. And while she is undergoing this mulligan-like miracle, the century staggers from one world conflict to another. Can the indestructible Ursula help save it? Should she even try? While you ponder these metaphysical puzzles, Atkinson gives you brilliantly drawn characters, a vivid reconstruction of England during the World War II blitz and a mind-twistingly good read.
Why you’ll like it:
A fresh and clever premise, a fantastical perspective on very real events, a meditation on free will and a style that combines humor with sadness are among the gifts Atkinson brings her readers in this hard-to-characterize and hard-to-put-down novel.
What others are saying:
“…[Atkinson's] very best…a big book that defies logic, chronology and even history in ways that underscore its author’s fully untethered imagination…[it] is full of mind games, but they are purposeful rather than emptily playful…Even without the sleight of hand, “Life After Life” would be an exceptionally captivating book with an engaging cast of characters,” says The New York Times.
Says Publishers Weekly: “Atkinson’s new novel … opens twice: first in Germany in 1930 with an English woman taking a shot at Hitler, then in England in 1910 when a baby arrives, stillborn. And then it opens again: still in 1910, still in England, but this time the baby lives. That baby is Ursula Todd, and as she grows up, she dies and lives repeatedly. Watching Atkinson bring Ursula into the world yet again initially feels like a not terribly interesting trick: we know authors have the power of life and death. But as Ursula and the century age, and war and epidemic and war come again, the fact of death, of “darkness,” as Atkinson calls it, falling on cities and people—now Ursula, now someone else, now Ursula again—turns out to be central. At heart this is a war story; half the book is given over to Ursula’s activities during WWII, and in its focus on the women and civilians usually overlooked or downplayed, it gives the Blitz its full measure of terror. By the end, which takes us back to that moment in 1930 and beyond, it’s clear that Atkinson’s not playing tricks; rather, through Ursula’s many lives and the accretion of what T.S. Eliot called “visions and revisions,” she’s found an inventive way to make both the war’s toll and the pull of alternate history, of darkness avoided or diminished, fresh. “
Kirkus Reviews says: “If you could travel back in time and kill Hitler, would you? Of course you would. Atkinson’s latest opens with that conceit, a hoary what-if of college dorm discussions and, for that matter, of other published yarns… But Atkinson isn’t being lazy, not in the least: Her protagonist’s encounter with der Führer is just one of several possible futures. Call it a more learned version of “Groundhog Day,” but that character can die at birth, or she can flourish and blossom; she can be wealthy, or she can be a fugitive; she can be the victim of rape, or she can choose her sexual destiny. All these possibilities arise, and all take the story in different directions, as if to say: We scarcely know ourselves, so what do we know of the lives of those who came before us, including our own parents and–in this instance–our unconventional grandmother? And all these possibilities sometimes entwine, near to the point of confusion. … there’s the rub with alternate realities, all of which, Atkinson suggests, can be folded up into the same life so that all are equally real. ….Provocative, entertaining and beautifully written. …”
“[S]tarting over and starting over, Ursula begins to retain impressions of her former lives. It’s not “Orlando”-esque reincarnation, nor is it the black joke of “Groundhog Day,” but some kind experiment in possibility. In one life a bundling seduction turns into a rape, and then an abortion; in another life the same seducer-rapist is cheerfully rebuffed, leaving no mark on the story. Ursula — she simply lives [the mystery], with a little more premonitory know-how each time. To the point where, having observed the currents of history as they flow (have flowed, will flow) around her and her family, she comes to the conclusion that it might be quite a good idea to kill Adolf Hitler. There. Now you have to read it,” says the Barnes & Noble Review.
When is it available?
Look for “Life After Life” at the Downtown Hartford Public Library.
Do you have something to say about this book, this author or books in general? Please post your comments here and I will respond. Let’s get a good books conversation going!
Nothing Gold Can Stay
By Ron Rash
(Ecco, $24.99, 256 pages)
Who is this author?
Ron Rash, whose novels and stories often are set in the wild and beautiful mountain region of North Carolina, writes about Appalachia and legacies of Southern pride and prejudice with the grit and grace that only a native can possess. His novel “Serena” was a 2009 PEN/Faulkner Finalist and New York Times bestselling novel, and three others — “One Foot in Eden,” “Saints at the River” and “The World Made Straight” – also were prizewinners. He has published three poetry collections and four of stories, including “Burning Bright,” which won the 2010 Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award. He also has won the O.Henry Prize twice. Rash teaches Appalachian Cultural Studies at Western Carolina University.
What is this book about?
It’s a collection of 14 short stories set in Appalachia, from the Civil War years to the present, featuring characters struggling in one way or another, and in some cases, for their very lives. “The Trusty,” which you may have read in The New Yorker, is about a chain-gang prisoner who hopes to get a beaten-down farm wife to help him escape. Another features two druggies out to steal a former boss’s disgusting war souvenirs. In another, a Scottish ballads researcher does some bragging that turns out to be spectacularly ill-advised. A darkly humorous story involves a bear trap. Each story is powerful in its own way; all are memorable.
By the way, if the title sounds familiar but you cannot place it, here is the entire Robert Frost poem from which it was taken:
Nothing Gold Can Stay
Nature’s first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf’s a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf,
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day
Nothing gold can stay.
Why you’ll like it:
Rash get kudos from reviewers for the way the beauty of his prose mitigates the dark violence that runs through these stories like a gorgeous but dangerous mountain torrent. He writes with authority about a much-maligned, frequently misunderstood part of America, where swollen pride and festering race-related anger keeps people with one foot in the past and another in the present. Too often the hill people of the Appalachian South are treated as comic caricatures, a la “The Beverly Hillbillies.” Rash makes them complex, human, occasionally appalling and always real.
What others are saying:
Says Janet Maslin in The New York Times: Ron Rash’s new short story collection… is excitingly versatile, covering time periods from the Civil War to the present and ranging in mood from wryly comic to brutal. The 14 stories are united by clean, tough specificity, courtly backwoods diction, and a capacity for sending shivers”.
“With ‘Nothing Gold Can Stay,’ Ron Rash cements his reputation as one of the foremost chroniclers of that mythic uber-America known as the South. Rash’s new stories depict, with almost anthropological precision, a proud, poverty-scarred milieu “where checkbooks never quite balanced and repo men and pawnbrokers loomed one turn of bad luck away,” says The Washington Post .
Publishers Weekly says: “Rash’s latest short fiction collection explores the often harsh vicissitudes of life in North Carolina. …“Night Hawks” features a former teacher with a self-inflicted facial scar who seeks refuge as a late-night radio DJ. Rash’s period stories, though, make the biggest impression, like the Depression-era “The Trusty,” in which a con man on a chain gang seduces a lonely farmer’s wife in the hope of using her to aid in his escape. In “The Magic Bus,” a 16-year-old country girl encounters two San Francisco hippies in a flower-painted VW microbus who entice her to run away with them. “The Dowry,” set immediately after the Civil War, relates how a pastor’s surprising sacrifice allows a young Union veteran to marry the daughter of a Confederate officer who lost his hand in battle. For a change of pace, in the humorous “A Sort of Miracle,” an accountant on an illegal bear hunt finds safety in the hands of his two slacker brothers-in-law. Although too many of the stories rely on the same basic dynamic, Rash impresses with clear-eyed, sympathetic writing about flawed and troubled characters.”
Says Library Journal: “His previous novels “Serena” and “The Cove” are set in the Appalachian Mountains of North Carolina, so it is no surprise that Rash … sets this collection of short stories in the same loosely defined but culturally abundant geographic region of the eastern United States. …Rash’s short stories thematically paint Appalachia not as a definitive place but as a series of many interconnected ways of relating to human and environmental frailty. VERDICT Another fine addition to the Rash bibliography, and a great entry point for the uninitiated reader…”
When is it available?
Nothing Gold Can Stay can be borrowed now from the Downtown Hartford Public Library.
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Tapestry of Fortunes
By Elizabeth Berg
(Random House, $26, 240 pages)
Who is this author?
Elizabeth Berg, who once lived in New England but is now a resident of suburban Chicago, could be said to actually live in women’s minds. Her best-selling evocations of women’s friendships, love affairs, marriages and heartbreak resonate powerfully with her readers. Her breakout book was “Durable Goods,” which was followed by many novels, including “Talk Before Sleep,” “Joy School,” “The Last Time I Saw You, Home Safe,” “The Year of Pleasures” and “Dream When You’re Feeling Blue.” She also has published two short story collections and two nonfiction books.
What is this book about?
Like many of Berg’s books, this is a story of women’s friendships and of women finding themselves through friendship. Here Cecelia, a motivational speaker in Minnesota, which is where Berg was born, is rocked by the death of a close friend and decides to re-examine her life. She sells her house and moves into another one with three roommates who also are dealing with transitions involving family and careers. When Cecilia gets a letter out of the blue from a former love, she is challenged to discover whether she has the courage to pursue abandoned paths and tie up the loose ends of her life.
Why you’ll like it:
Berg had me at “Talk Before Sleep,” one of those novels you read in one sitting and re-read with pleasure. Before she was an author, Berg was a registered nurse, and the compassion necessary for that endeavor carries over into her writing. One of her gifts is her ability to get into the minds of her female characters and take her readers there, too. Another is her skill at writing dialogue that rings true and is funny when it needs to be and tender when it ought to be. It is this wonderful confluence of true-to-life characters and circumstances and authentic dialogue that animates her stories and keeps her large and loving readership eager to pick up the next Berg novel.
Here is what Berg told a Chicago Tribune reviewer about her work:
“… I think you have to write a lot of books before you know what it is you’re writing about, and as I look back, I consistently write about relationships, love, loss, resiliency — about life, really. It’s beautiful, life, but it’s really hard, too, and I want there to be both sides in every book I write. I want there to be humor and I want there to be pathos. In this particular book, though, there’s some poignancy in it, but it’s not as serious as some things I’ve written. This is kind of my women-just-want-to-have-fun book. After all, who doesn’t want to have a little fun?”
What others are saying:
Library Journal says: “Craving change, Cecilia Ross takes time off, disposes of her home, and moves into a grand old house in St. Paul with three roommates. The four women decide to take a road trip, one to connect with the daughter she gave up, another with a former husband; a professional chef wants to check out other restaurants. As for Cecilia, that unexpected letter from former heartthrob Dennis Helsinger has her sailing on the wind. Who better to tell this story than quintessential women’s author Berg?
“Maybe Freud didn’t know the answer to what women want, but Elizabeth Berg certainly does,” says The Seattle Times.
Says Booklistonline.com: “Any woman who has ever longed to shake off her life and embark on a road trip with female companions will love “Tapestry of Fortunes.” Cecilia Ross, a motivational speaker who teaches others to live their truth, is unable to follow her own advice. When she receives a postcard out of the blue from the one man she never got over, she realizes it’s time to turn her regrets around. She seeks guidance from the fortune-telling devices that she stores in a box in the bedroom closet. Acting on their messages, Cece puts her house on the market, moves in with three women who are equally restless, and takes off with this newfound pack of friends, each on a mission to find the people and opportunities they missed. This book has all the ingredients for a highly satisfying read: a backroads journey, a testament to the power of female friendships, and the possibility of second chances. Berg strips her writing down to what is essential and takes an unflinching look at lifelong regrets. The characters are so completely realized, even the bit players will settle in your heart.”
When is it available?
It’s your good fortune that Berg’s latest is at the Downtown Hartford Public Library and its Blue Hills, Goodwin, Mark Twain and Ropkins branches.
Do you have something to say about this book, this author or books in general? Please post your comments here and I will respond. Let’s get a good books conversation going!
Hello, Gorgeous: Becoming Barbra Streisand
By William J. Mann
(Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, $30, 576 pages)
Who is this author?
William J. Mann is adept at writing biographies of the famous and talented. His 2006 book, “Kate: The Woman Who Was Hepburn,” was a New York Times Notable Book. He’s also the author of “How to Be a Movie Star: Elizabeth Taylor in Hollywood, 1941-1981,” “Edge of Midnight: The Life of John Schlesinger.” “Behind the Screen: How Gays and Lesbians Shaped Hollywood” and “Wisecracker: The Life and Times of William Haines.” Mann has homes in Provincetown on Cape Cod and New York City.
What is this book about?
Barbra. Babs. La Streisand. You may think you already know everything there is to know about this iconic singer with the face that launched a thousand quips and the voice that still mesmerizes, but William J. Mann’s biography will prove you wrong. He takes a deep and detailed look at her early years, showing how it contained the seeds that would blossom into one of the most successful and respected careers in American show business. Here is how he welcomes readers to the book:
“Just five years after arriving in Manhattan as a seventeen-year-old kid without money or connections, Barbra Streisand was the top-selling female recording artist in America and the star of one of Broadway’s biggest hits. Twenty-two years old, her face graced the covers of Time and Life. That was only the beginning of a career that has marched its band and beat its drum for half a century, but everything Streisand has accomplished in that time can be traced right back to this first half decade of her professional life.”
Why you’ll like it:
Mann is a meticulous researcher who writes with verve, a winning combination for any biographer. I had the pleasure of interviewing him about his Hepburn book, and I recall that his enthusiasm for his subject and respect for her achievements was contagious. According to its many positive reviews, he brings the same skills to “Hello, Gorgeous.” Streisand fan or not, you are likely to be impressed this book, which offers deep insights but is not hampered by a stuffy academic approach.
What others are saying:
Says Booklist: “Before she was Barbra, she was Barbara, a homely Brooklyn kid who had an unshakable belief that she would be a star. What she didn’t think was that fame would come through her singing voice. Streisand wanted to be an actress; she saw Shakespeare in her future, not Fanny Brice. Mann takes readers from the day Streisand took the train from Brooklyn to Manhattan and ends with her as the toast of Broadway. He seems to have gotten closer than most to some friends and co-workers of the early Streisand—first love Barry Dennen, first husband Elliott Gould, manager Marty Erlichman—and he’s lucky that she left a paper trail of interviews. Mann seems to have combed through every one, looked at the old videos, and has even gone as far as to check Noël Coward’s schedule for 1960 to prove he could not have seen Streisand sing at Bon Soir. Though some of this is well-trod ground, Streisand fans will come away feeling they’ve had a ringside seat at her early career, and they will leave the show applauding.’’
“In previous biographies, William J. Mann has chronicled the lives of Elizabeth Taylor and Katherine Hepburn, two talented actresses whose riveting beauty seemed to ensure their fame. With “Hello, Gorgeous,” he turns his attention to Barbra Streisand, who has been described impolitely as an awkward ugly duckling who gate-crashed her way to fame. That image, which Barbra herself reinforced with her early choice of roles, conceals her multiple talents, her extraordinary drive, and her complexity. In this full-bodied exploration of Streisand’s early years, Mann describes the rise of the Brooklyn-born singer who began her career in “off-off-off Broadway” productions and small gay Greenwich Village nightclubs. A fascinating biography that tells us how Barbara became Barbra,” says Barnes & Noble.
“…Mann does something a little different here, focusing on Barbra Streisand’s breakout years: the early Sixties, when she vaulted from hopeful nobody to the star of “Funny Girl” on Broadway and singer with three platinum albums. …Theater lovers will swoon,” says Library Journal.
Kirkus Reviews
“…Barbra Streisand is such a cultural institution that it sometimes seems as if she sprang fully grown from the head of the entertainment industry. Not so, argues the author in this surprisingly suspenseful and masterfully paced biography. …Mann appropriately gives credit to the agents, accompanists, directors and mentors who brought her idiosyncratic style to a generation hungry for new idols. He also delves into her paradoxical mixture of self-confidence and -doubt, disclosing that she privately felt insecure about her looks despite publicly flaunting an outlandish flair for fashion and a loopy sense of humor. …Even though we know the answers to most of the questions–Will our heroine win the coveted role of Fanny Brice in “Funny Girl”? Will she live happily ever after with her Prince Charming, Elliott Gould?–this book makes getting to them a treat, says Kirkus Reviews.
When is it available?
People who visit the Downtown Hartford Public Library are the luckiest people in the world: this book is on its new book shelf.
Do you have something to say about this book, this author or books in general? Please post your comments here and I will respond. Let’s get a good books conversation going!
Cover of Snow
By Jenny Milchman
(Ballantine, $26, 336 pages)
Who is this author?
This is the debut novel by Jenny Milchman, who lives in New Jersey and is a psychotherapist. On her website, she says she first began “writing’ at age 2, when she would dictate bedroom stories to her mother, who dutifully wrote them down. Milchman says it took her 11 years to get published, and this novel, her “first,” is actually the eighth one she has written.
What is this book about?
Set in the Adirondack mountains, it is the story of Nora, a young wife – make that widow – who awakes one cold morning to find that her husband Brendan, a police officer, has killed himself. But as she begins to come out of her grief, she cannot but notice odd things that just do not add up. Why was there no suicide note? Why did no one see this coming? Why are Brendan’s police buddies, best friend and even his mother so reluctant to pursue answers? Nora must do some investigating on her own, and what she discovers – and risks – make this an absorbing thriller.
Why you’ll like it:
Reviewers are praising this story’s intriguing twists and turns and Milchman’s understanding of grief and how it clouds the mind and hurts the heart. While this book is a thriller and follows the path of that genre, it also offers insights into the causes of suicide and its effects on those left behind, and it does a nice job of exploring the ways life in a small town can be both comforting and claustrophobic.
What others are saying:
Bookreporter says: “Milchman is one of those authors who is capable of painting a mood of foreboding within an opening sentence or two. …Lest one think that they have stumbled into a modern-day version of “The Andy Griffith Show,” “Cover Of Snow” fires a shot across the bow within a first couple of pages with Brendan’s sudden and totally unexpected suicide. Nora is beside herself, having no idea what might have driven her husband to commit such an act when their lives seemed almost idyllic. It is only in the aftermath of Brendan’s death that Nora gradually begins to uncover her husband’s past history and realizes how little she knew about the man she thought she knew so well….”Cover Of Snow” is quite dark in tone and mood, which in turn contrasts with the backdrop of ever-present snow literally blanketing every scene. The weather is not a friend to Nora; rather, it is cold, treacherous, concealing and unrelenting. One does not think of Christmas, sleigh bells or family reunions but rather of frostbite, hazardous traveling, and chills from within and without. And of course, much can be concealed under a “cover of snow.” This is a memorable debut from an author who promises much and delivers.”
“Well-defined characters take us on an emotional roller-coaster ride through the darkest night, with blinding twists and occasionally fatal turns. This is a richly woven story that not only looks at the devastating effects of suicide but also examines life in a small town and explores the complexity of marriage. Fans of Nancy Pickard, Margaret Maron, and C. J. Box will be delighted to find this new author,” says Booklist in a starred review.
The New York Times says: “Milchman reveals an intimate knowledge of the psychology of grief, along with a painterly gift for converting frozen feelings into scenes of a forbidding winter landscape.”
“Milchman makes [readers] feel the chill right down to their bones and casts a particularly effective mood in this stylish thriller,” says Kirkus Reviews.
When is it available?
You can uncover this book at the Downtown Hartford Public Library or its Mark Twain Branch.
Do you have something to say about this book, this author or books in general? Please post your comments here and I will respond. Let’s get a good books conversation going!
Abide With Me
By Sabin Willett
(Simon & Schuster, $16, 384 pages)
Who is this author?
Sabin Willett, a lawyer who lives in Natick, Mass. and spends a lot of time in Vermont, is also a novelist. He studied Classics at Harvard, and worked as a police reporter before earning his law degree. His previous three novels are “The Deal,” “The Betrayal” and “Present Value.” His current book, “Abide With Me,” was inspired by Willett’s experience as a defense attorney at the Guantanamo military base. It was there, he writes, that he began developing the main characters of the book, Roy and Emma.
What is this book about?
Think “Wuthering Heights,” if that classic romantic novel had been set in the hills of Vermont, not the English moors.
Roy Murphy, a wild and sometimes violent kid, grows up fast in Afghanistan, but one thing never changes. He’s still in the grip of a deep romantic fascination with his hometown’s lovely rich girl, Emma Herrick, who was briefly his high school girlfriend. She, not coincidentally, lives in the Hoosick Falls mansion known as “the Heights,” which has seen better days.
When Roy comes back from the war, he aims to grab some of the Herricks’ fame and fortune. And Emma, even though she has married while Roy was gone.
Why you’ll like it:
Tales of star-crossed lovers have universal appeal, and this one, which is underpinned by scenes that capture the grimness of the war in Afghanistan, is out to break your heart. Not every reviewer liked the book, however. The Washington Post was particularly unimpressed and Kirkus Reviews snarked thusly: “Too much wuthering, too few heights…” Nevertheless, other reviewers found it a good read.
What others are saying:
“Sabin Willett mines his settings of Afghanistan and small-town New England with equal gusto. “Abide with Me” is a big, generous, tasty, funny, rich novel,” says author Stewart O’Nan.
Library Journal says: “Roy Murphy left his Vermont hometown of Hoosick Bridge as the local bad boy. He returns as a veteran of the Afghanistan war. When he departed, he was madly in love with Emma Herrick, and this soldier still pines for her when he walks back into town. Emma is a member of Hoosick Bridge’s first family… Gossip quickly begins to swirl as Roy seeks to rekindle what he had as a young man even though Emma has married and moved on. VERDICT Willett’s reinterpretation of Emily Brontë’s “Wuthering Heights” adds a fresh contemporary take to a classic love story by detailing the very real consequences of men returning to normal society after being subjected to the terrors of war.”
Kirkus Reviews says: “He’s a bad boy from the trailer park; she’s a princess in small-town Vermont; but their electric connection spans class and time. Sound familiar? The second-best thing that happened to young Roy Murphy was being sent to juvenile detention after firing a gun to scare off the drug dealer preying on his mother. The best thing was his magical 10-week teenage affair with Emma Herrick, the beautiful blonde daughter of Hoosick Bridge’s first family. In his fourth novel, Willett updates the star-crossed love story of “Wuthering Heights,” while adding dashes of Homer, “Jane Eyre” and a “Band of Brothers”–style camaraderie. The looping narrative, full of foreboding and forewarning, is at its strongest during scenes of Murphy’s five-year military term in Afghanistan. Returning, he learns of Emma’s father’s financial disgrace and suicide and Emma’s engagement to nice, preppy lawyer George. Roy now devotes himself to making money, so successfully that two years later he can buy Emma’s family home, the Heights, which he shares with Emma’s half-demented mother and George’s boho sister Izzy, who is now Roy’s occasional lover, until a mysterious fire redraws the landscape. Too much wuthering, too few heights in a story that describes eternal passion but doesn’t give it life or a satisfactory ending.”
When is it available?
“Ábide With Me” is at the Downtown Hartford Public Library now.
Do you have something to say about this book, this author or books in general? Please post your comments here and I will respond. Let’s get a good books conversation going!
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