« No More Moping | Main | Mr. Ambivalent »
April 17, 2006
Books I Read This Spring
A Good Place for the Night
by Savyon Liebrecht
Publishers Weekly: This collection by one of Israel's most popular authors turns upon issues of family, place and disconnection, and the stories have the dreamy, evocative smoothness of underwater films. Hadassah, whose mother moves with another woman's husband and daughter to the U.S. when Haddassah is young, narrates "America." Her observation, on the day her mother leaves, that she "was frightened by the unfamiliar sensations flooding me, as if I'd lost my old place and still didn't have a new one" is a representative sentiment of the collection, as the protagonist in each story grapples with emotional and geographical dislocation. Disorientation afflicts Liebrecht's characters from the Israeli reporter in Munich to cover a Nazi war trial ("Munich") to the mentally handicapped man trying to make a life among unsympathetic members of a kibbutz ("Kibbutz"). In the last and finest story, "A Good Place for the Night," a woman struggles to survive in an unnamed place virtually destroyed by a nuclear catastrophe. The permanent unsettledness of Israel is exported and globalized here; no matter where Liebrecht's characters go or what they do, they are never yet truly at home.
My Review: This was a hard book to read, because the writing style made me work to follow along. I thought that some of the stories were more captivating than others, but perhaps that was because I was reading them late at night when I wasn't as attentive as I might have been. On the other hand, I have found myself thinking about each of the stories days later, so it clearly touched me despite the challenging material.
----------
What We Believe but Cannot Prove : Today's Leading Thinkers on Science in the Age of Certainty
by John Brockman
Publishers Weekly: The title's question was posed on Edge.org (an online intellectual clearing house), challenging more than 100 intellectuals of every stripe—from Richard Dawkins to Ian McEwan—to confess the personal theories they cannot demonstrate with certainty. The results, gathered by literary agent and editor Brockman, is a stimulating collection of micro-essays (mainly by scientists) divulging many of today's big unanswered questions reaching across the plane of human existence. Susan Blackmore, a lecturer on evolutionary theory, believes "it is possible to live happily and morally without believing in free will," and Daniel Goleman believes children today are "unintended victims of economic and technological progress." Other beliefs are more mundane and one is highly mathematically specific. Many contributors open with their discomfort at being asked to discuss unproven beliefs, which itself is an interesting reflection of the state of science. The similarity in form and tone of the responses makes this collection most enjoyable in small doses, which allow the answers to spark new questions and ideas in the reader's mind. It's unfortunate that the tone of most contributions isn't livelier and that there aren't explanations of some of the more esoteric concepts discussed; those limitations will keep these adroit musings from finding a wider audience.
My Review: It's true that a handful of the essays were completely beyond my ken, but the vast majority of them were a fascinating glimpse into what the world's most prominent scientists are thinking about. I was a little disappointed that so few women and international voices were heard, but I suppose that reflects the nature of the "top scientific leaders (who can write in fluent English)" gets you. Also noted: these essays can be read for free at www.edge.org.
----------
Locked Rooms
by Laurie R. King
Publishers Weekly: In her last outing, The Game (2004), Mary Russell and her husband, Sherlock Holmes, traveled to India on a case of geopolitical significance, but in the richly imagined eighth novel in this acclaimed series, set in San Francisco in 1922, Russell undertakes a far more personal investigation. Since she began her journey back to her hometown—ostensibly to deal with her father's estate—Russell has been tormented by strange dreams, one of which involves the "locked rooms" of the title, and the sight of her San Francisco childhood home opens a flood of memories and emotions, most of which she's loathe to allow into her über-rational mind. When someone takes a shot at her, Holmes enlists the help of Pinkerton agent Dashiell Hammett and Russell tries to unlock her past, in particular the "accident" that killed her family and left her an orphan in 1914. King's re-creation of San Francisco, especially the backstory during the devastating 1906 earthquake, is superb, and it's a pleasure to see the unusually competent Russell struggling with her own psyche. The plot may be a bit thin, but the narrative has real momentum, the characters are engaging and the prose, as always, is intelligent, evocative and graceful.
My Review: This is the latest edition of the Russell-Holmes series and I'm sad to think that I'll have to wait months (maybe even years) until the next one comes out. I *heart* Mary Russell.
---------
Snow Flower and the Secret Fan
by Lisa See
Publishers Weekly: See's engrossing novel set in remote 19th-century China details the deeply affecting story of lifelong, intimate friends (laotong, or "old sames") Lily and Snow Flower, their imprisonment by rigid codes of conduct for women and their betrayal by pride and love. While granting immediacy to Lily's voice, See (Flower Net) adroitly transmits historical background in graceful prose. Her in-depth research into women's ceremonies and duties in China's rural interior brings fascinating revelations about arranged marriages, women's inferior status in both their natal and married homes, and the Confucian proverbs and myriad superstitions that informed daily life. Beginning with a detailed and heartbreaking description of Lily and her sisters' foot binding ("Only through pain will you have beauty. Only through suffering will you have peace"), the story widens to a vivid portrait of family and village life. Most impressive is See's incorporation of nu shu, a secret written phonetic code among women—here between Lily and Snow Flower—that dates back 1,000 years in the southwestern Hunan province ("My writing is soaked with the tears of my heart,/ An invisible rebellion that no man can see"). As both a suspenseful and poignant story and an absorbing historical chronicle, this novel has bestseller potential and should become a reading group favorite as well.
My Review: We'll see if the book is a reading group favorite, because we're scheduled to discuss it on Tuesday night. Personally, I enjoyed it but wasn't engrossed. I've read my fair share of Chinese fiction (Amy Tan, Ha Jin, etc.) and I've gotten the whole "women who have no independence outside the home find strength in their relationships with other women" thing.
----------
Somebody's Heart Is Burning : A Woman Wanderer in Africa
by Tanya Shaffer
Publishers Weekly: Shaffer's vivid travel memoir captures scenes of Kenya, Mali and, most notably, Ghana, rarely seen by American tourists. Fleeing a marriage proposal from her boyfriend in California, Shaffer, a white 27-year-old upper-middle-class performance artist with progressive politics, decides to travel, choosing to participate in various volunteer efforts in order to spend more time and less money in Africa. Her tales are rich in visual and cultural explication; villages and hamlets too tiny for names come to hot, vibrant, scent-laden, insect-thrumming life as Shaffer depicts the dailiness of African culture and the struggle to subsist. The unrelenting heat, ubiquitous disease and economic chaos make Africans eager to leave. Unfortunately, racism and privilege underlie Shaffer's travelogue, and she does not fully address either. In one of the book's best chapters, Shaffer meets Nadhiri, a black separatist from Berkeley with whom she does a complex sociopolitical dance in which Nadhiri's prejudice is revealed, but Shaffer's own motives are not. Throughout, Shaffer notes the bigotry of Africans toward African-Americans, but never her possible own. Nor does she explore the reality of grinding African poverty in comparison to her own relatively immense privilege. Regrettably, no coda follows Shaffer's compelling memoir. In the end, Shaffer battles malaria, leaving readers caught in her febrile dreams of Africa and her California lover, wishing the author had deepened her reportage.
My Review: I could not disagree more with the "official" review. I thought the beauty of the writing was that it left the reader to ask the question "how would I have reacted in this situation". Perhaps it's because I fall into the "white 27-year-old upper-middle-class performance artist with progressive politics" (all except the performance artist part, admittedly) category a little too perfectly, but I thought the memoir was superbly written.
