In the Country of Brooklyn by Peter Golenbock

Aloha, everyone! I'd apologize for my absence, but I think I already did that. I've been busy spending all my savings on Christmas presents and car repairs, and in a few weeks, I'll be busy spending the rest of my savings on a new car (unless there's one in my driveway on Christmas morning with a gigantic bow on it - ha! That's a nice fantasy...) and a new laptop (as for the old one? hard drive failing). Luckily I've still got my dad's relic (it runs Windows 98! YouTube is phasing out its browser! Ha!) to type out the occasional review and to hack away futilely at the backlog in my Google Reader (even with the occasional comment so everyone will know I'm still here...somewhere). Amid the strife that this month has brought me, I've also been engaging in lots of Christmasy fun in NYC and at day long Christmas parties and attending a delightful "holiday brunch" at work and, of course, listening to Christmas music nearly non-stop and have thus managed to regenerate a good deal of holiday cheer that I thought was lost forever from a week or few of almost laughable bad fortune which prompted my loving father to rename me "black cloud."

And today, I have even more reason to celebrate because I've finished it. My arch-nemesis review copy. Peter Golenbock's epically huge oral history of Brooklyn, In the Country of Brooklyn, which I so foolishly requested from LibraryThing Early Reviewers not realizing how ginormous it would be. Now this book has been skulking about in various states of "readness" for probably more than a year, serving as the considerable base of most of my "reading now" piles that I'm not actually reading. As a Christmas gift to myself, I decided to finally get this monkey off my back (or, well, at least off my bedroom floor) and give my sad and pathetic reading page totals a boost for the year with its well beyond considerable 663 pages. The two of us have such a long history, that I almost don't know how I'll finally review it, but I think I'll manage....


In the Country of Brooklyn is Peter Golenbock's compilation of dozens and dozens and dozens and possibly a few more dozen interviews he conducted with various residents of Brooklyn throughout its last almost-century of history. Through the spoken experience of various average and important personages of Brooklyn through the years, Golenbock attempts to give us a sense of an exciting and progressive place, home to the entire spectrum of immigrants that eventually found their way to the United States, that spawned a variety of political activists, sports heroes, as well as an impressive array of cultural contributions. Golenbock uses his interviews to comment on Brooklyn's struggle and ultimate willingness to integrate its diverse population, the struggle to get government to recognize and respond to the needs of its people, its present efforts to rejuvenate parts of the community that have fallen into disuse and disrepair, and, given its length, much, much more.

Golenbock must have taken an incredible amount of time to speak with his many subjects and transcribe their words, and it shows. This book is packed with the thoughts and memories of countless people connected in some way to Brooklyn. These interviews make up the meat of the book. Most are interesting, and many are downright compelling. In addition, there are past and present pictures of Booklyn as well as of each of the interviews' subjects which is another definite addition to this book.

That said, if you're going to read this book, read it for the interviews. Golenbock's background and assorted "filler" information is at times, unfortunately, downright painful to read. Golenbock's wild generalizations and obvious political intrusions will bother any serious historian and any average person who happens to disagree with his views. The book's organization is also sorely lacking. While the interviews are a pleasure to read, Golenbock seems to struggle to make them coalesce around any sort of main point. Indeed, some of the interviewees, while interesting, seem to have only the most fleeting of connections with Brooklyn which, it seems, Golenbock might have been attempting to include in an effort to define Brooklyn in a certain way that doesn't quite seem to pan out. Instead what we have is a massive tome that, once you've passed the midway point, seems to drag on to some uncertain destination that is never reached. With a good edit for page count and organization and perhaps an overhaul of Golenbock's background information, In the Country of Brooklyn, with all its potent first person accounts, could have packed quite a punch, but as it stands, it will leave real history buffs wishing for something a little more substantial.

Disclaimer: In the Country of Brooklyn was sent to me at no cost by Harper Collins/William Morrow in conjunction with LibraryThing Early Reviewers.

Black Angels by Linda Beatrice Brown

Wow, it's been a while since I've shown my face here. I'm sorry for my general blogosphere scarcity, but I would be remiss if I didn't tell you to expect more of the same. As the holidays descend with alarming quickness (can it really be Thanksgiving next week?), and all of my belongings seems to be breaking down or requiring extra attention (do I own them or do they own me???), and the prospect of a few weekend outings loom large in my future, I can say with pretty good authority that you probably won't be seeing a good deal of me until, perhaps, after Christmas.

However, this is not an official hiatus notice, just a perhaps unnecessary heads up. If I do manage to crop up, I promise I'll have a book review or few for you as we approach the end of the year whenever I can reasonably manage it (AKA whenever I reasonably feel like it), as I am a good few behind. As a matter of fact, I quite intend to have one for you today.

A while back I read a great review of Black Angels by Linda Beatrice Brown by Susan at Bloggin' 'Bout Books. So great, in fact, that instead of simply adding it to my wish list and moving on as is my typical practice (sorry, bloggers!), I actually commented that I would be adding it to my wish list. In due course, Susan gave my name to Stacey at Penguin Young Readers, and I found myself in possession of a review copy. (Oh FTC, I hope you're "listening"!). So thanks to Susan and Stacey, and now on with the review!


Black Angels is a historical fiction account of three children who for various reasons find themselves lost and alone during the waning days of the American Civil War. First Brown introduces us to Luke, an 11-year-old slave running away to meet other runaways whose goal is to head north and fight for the Union. Then we meet Daylily, a nine-year-old slave girl, alone in the woods having witnessed an act of unspeakable violence. Finally we meet 7-year-old white Caswell, who is fleeing his burning home in search of his probably-dead mother. After their first rainy night alone, the three find each other in the morning, and figuring that without each other they will be totally alone, they form an unlikely trio and determine to head north to safety, or so they hope.

When the ragtag trio, in a moment of desperate need, happen upon a mysterious Indian woman, their paths are changed in more ways then one. She feeds them, clothes them, and seems to know the vast potential that lies inside each of "her" children. As the war drags on into its final days, her wisdom and love will prove even more invaluable than her provision.

Black Angels is a captivating tale of three children who become the forerunners of the many people who have helped heal our nation from years of hatred and prejudice. It teaches the timeless lessons that there are bonds much deeper than blood or color, that we are all essentially the same, and that love gives us the power to overcome in a world that doesn't always understand. It offers younger readers an unflinching but not overpowering glimpse of the Civil War and the miserable years of slavery and the extreme racism that continued long after the war had ended, but at the same time it employs its characters to show readers how wrong it all was and give them hope for our nation's and even humanity's future.

My one complaint would be that the book occasionally dabbles in preachiness, but the instances are few and don't take much away from the book, and for that matter, might not even be so noticeable depending upon the age of the reader. Other than that, Black Angels is a big hearted, beautifully crafted tale of the American Civil War, and I'd wholeheartedly recommend it to historical fiction fans both young and old.

The Fireman's Wife by Jack Riggs

Sooooo, I learned something from the Read-a-thon. I learned that I miss reading one book at a time, just one so I can be caught up in just it instead of spreading my attention too thin trying to be engrossed in a few at a time. So, it's back to one book at a time for me, and I like it, but we'll see how long it lasts. Somehow it feels like you're getting more read when you're reading more than one book at a time, though I'm starting to see that, for me, that might not be true.

Anyhow, that's enough with the personal interlude. I'm still wildly behind on my reviewing. Well, for me, I mean. So, on with the show!


Cassie and Peck Johnson's marriage is falling apart. In fact, it's probably been falling apart since it began when Cassie became pregnant with their daughter Kelly during one lovedrunk summer at the beach. Disowned by her Baptist minister father, Cassie is forced to leave the mountain home she loves and her hopes of a college education to move to the sweltering South Carolina low country. There she all but loses her identity in the everyday struggles of raising a daughter and trying to love a fire chief husband who seems to be more involved with his crew than his family. Cassie isn't sure what she wants from life, but she knows that to find out, she'll have to escape strong, steady Peck and his beloved low country, the ties of which she can always feel tight around her.

Sure that this time, really, is the time she is leaving for good, Cassie sets off for the mountains with Kelly and Peck's friend Clay determined to escape from the life that has bound her for so long. Soon, though, she learns that getting away isn't so simple as simply packing her things and driving away. When unexpected events occur, Cassie finds that the new life she's pursuing isn't quite what she'd imagined and maybe not what she's searching for at all.

Told in chapters alternating between Peck and Cassie's perspectives, The Fireman's Wife is a story of a marriage collapsing under the weight of its own past. At the start, the novel is less than captivating. Its choppy, belabored beginning chapters populated by characters who come off as selfish and none too likeable make for rough going. Riggs' beginning is a bit forced and a little too obvious in the telling, and his two main characters don't exactly leap off the page. Luckily, however, as the story continues, it shakes off many of its problems. By the midpoint of the book, Cassie and Peck are more genuinely fleshed out and readers are more involved in their story and their problems. The alternating viewpoints manage to successfully present both sides of an argument that the two never really manage to have. Even the mountains and the low country come to life so that readers can share in the characters' deep love for the essence of their respective homes. Ultimately, readers can't help but pull for the two to heal the damage of their shared past and find a way to reconcile their differences.

The Fireman's Wife is not the perfect novel, but if you can look past some of its ticks (a clunky first fifty pages, an occasional awkwardness in the first person present tense narration, and perhaps an irritating overuse of the expression "pissed off"), it is a sweet story that reminds us both that love isn't always easy, but is worth it, and how sometimes to love another, we first need to know and love ourselves.


(This is a review copy compliments of Random House via LibraryThing Early Reviewers.)

First Comes Love, Then Comes Malaria by Eve Brown-Waite

Once upon a time, and you may remember this if you've been with me a while, before BBAW, I used to, you know, actually review a book from time to time. First Comes Love, Then Comes Malaria has been patiently waiting on my desk for an opportune time that just hasn't come. Its very presence there has been causing me a good deal of guilt and strife. So much guilt, in fact, that I found myself thinking the other morning in the shower about reviewing it, and then I began writing, in the confines of my barely awake mind, what I considered to be an excellent review. Now, I consider myself to be a great multi-tasker, but writing reviews in the shower simply poses some logistical difficulties that are rather impossible to overcome, which is why I'm sitting here now with barely an inkling left in my memory of what it was that I was going to say in my fantastic "barely awake mind review" which means we'll have to settle for this mediocre barely awake blog review.


Eve's joining of the Peace Corps was a long time coming. When the "I'll-be-joining-the-Peace-Corps" line begins to get a little thin, she knows it's time to finally go through with it. She's got one problem, though. She seems to be falling for her clean cut, "epitome of a good guy" Peace Corps recruiter, John. As her departure date nears, she wants less and less to follow through with her pledge to spend two years in a developing nation and more and more to stay with her one true love. Unfortunately, scrapping the Peace Corps probably means scrapping her relationship with John anyway, so it's off to Ecuador for Eve. Once there, she finds the experience to be even less rewarding than she expected as she has more than a little difficulty convincing people to actually put her to work. Finally, she finds a niche taking homeless boys back to their families, but soon after an unexpected tragedy reveals a secret from her past that has her returning to states and her future husband.

The meat of this book, though, is when John takes a job with CARE in Uganda. Here Eve's committment is put to the test as she is forced to take a chance on another developing country and adjust to life in a rural Ugandan outpost noted for its excess of guerilla activity. Here Eve will learn that compared to everyone else she is rich, gigantic bugs are a daily reality, and malaria is much easier to come by than a telephone.

Brown-Waite has an easy, conversational writing style that invites us into a very troubled African nation without simply focusing on the trouble. Brown-Waite truly brings the people of Uganda to life for her readers. Her stories are often laugh out loud funny and point out the quirks and celebrate the culture of a nation, that though struggling, seems to be filled with an unexpectedly optimistic, joyful people. Unlike many memoirs of Africa, Brown-Waite's manages to reveal the many issues facing Uganda without marinating us in a dark, dismal reflection on the "unsolveable" problems of a nation afflicted with extreme poverty and disease.

First Comes Love, Then Comes Malaria is a captivating and heartfelt love story of how Eve Brown-Waite fell first for a man and then for a nation. Brown-Waite's journey from inept bush housewife looking for a purpose to a thriving expat with a passion for this rather backward Ugandan community was a pleasure to read. Here's hoping that she is already busy writing about her adventures in Uzbekistan and beyond, as I would gladly go along for the ride!

The Texicans by Nina Vida

Joseph Kimmel is a simple man, a man as content as a fur trapper as he is as a school teacher, a man who has never longed for the encumbrances of a wife and family. He is pleased to be without any obligation except to himself, that is, until a letter arrives in June of 1845 from Joseph's brother's business partner in Texas announcing his brother's death and extolling the virtues of Texas. Soon he sheds his humdrum life as a schoolteacher and sets out for Texas to settle his brother's estate and perhaps find some free land and adventure along the way. Suffice it to say that Joseph gets far more than he bargained for.

Robbed of his horse by an escaped slave, Joseph is discovered by one Henry Castro, a Frenchman determined to create a town of his own in Texas using sheer force of will and a pack of ignorant Alsatian settlers who he has convinced to come along for the ride. That's when things begin to get out of hand. Without intending to, Joseph stays a few years in Castroville and leaves with a wife he never intended to have and doesn't love as well as the very escaped slave that stole his belongings and landed him Castroville to begin with. As he travels across Texas in search of land and a relatively safe place to settle, Joseph finds himself "encumbered" with more and more people including another ex-slave with only one leg and his family as well as the intoxicating Aurelia, who is rumored to be a Mexican witch. After making a fragile peace with the local indian tribe, Joseph and his adopted family settle down to a life of ranching, but life on the frontier is fraught with dangers and tragedy will ultimately shape the lives of those that Joseph has learned to hold dear.

The Texicans is a well-written novel populated by a wide variety of quite three dimensional characters. The main characters, especially Joseph and Aurelia, the Mexican "witch," are believable and sympathetic. While reading this story, I kept envisioning Joseph as a John Wayne-esque sort of a character, a quiet loner of a guy, strong, competent, and independent but with a heart of gold that prevents him from casting off his unwanted entourage. His circumstances bring out a sort of begrudging heroism hidden behind his stony exterior. Aurelia's story brings out just the slightest bit of magical realism in a tale that mostly consists of a simple, hardscrabble existence in frontier Texas. The frontier itself is as much a character as the rest, casting the human characters in sharp relief against itself and shaping each of them with its power.

Vida has created a quiet story and one in which the characters only slowly make their way into your heart, and you only realize how deeply you care for them when tragedy strikes. Somehow, though, I didn't quite connect with it. There were a few times when I thought maybe I was making a connection, but they were short-lived. Perhaps it was the mood I was in when I read it or that the story seemed to peter out more than it seemed to definitively end. The epilogue seems almost tacked on as an afterthought to bring closure to a story so realistic that real closure is impossible. This is a novel that has very little artistically wrong with it, but one that, for me, failed to make the leap from a good story to a great one.

On a side note - I love the cover art on this. This is definitely something I would grab if I were just browsing around the book store and happened upon it. The horse, the people in the distance, the menacing cloudy sky - it all works very well and suits the book to a T. Bravo!

Many thanks to the author for sending me a copy for review.

More reviews can be found at...

Book Chase
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Cheryl's Book Nook

Don't Call Me a Crook! by Bob Moore

Don't Call Me a Crook! is a memoir by the most unreliable of narrators. Despite not wanting to be called a crook, Bob Moore most certainly is one. An engineer by trade, his adventures take him all over the world where he finds himself "swiping" anything from diamonds to cash to a Shriner's sword. Moore's twenties really roared, and his experiences paint a picture of an era when lawlessness was a way of life. Bob's adventures take him to New York where he rips off a smuggler's diamonds, to Chicago where he cons a gullible woman out of her diamond ring, to a party yacht on the Long Island Sound, to South America where he makes off with funds given him for a supposed business start up, and even to China where the lawlessness seems to shock even him. There is no doubt that Bob Moore was a product of his time and had the experiences to prove it, but well, actually, there is some doubt, at least in my mind, about whether the stories he tells are true. After all, the very life he chronicles gives us reason to question everything he says. How can you trust the storytelling of a guy who gets by on lies and dishonest gain?

Whether it's true or not, though, Don't Call Me a Crook! is a rollicking adventure. While Moore's style of writing is a little stilted and hard to read, his tale is full of action and what seems like a particularly honest and unflinching view at the 20s. Few pages go by where Moore isn't getting into or getting out of some trouble. Admittedly, Moore's routine of getting "oiled" (drunk) and making trouble can get redundant, but at other times his experiences are laugh out loud funny. It's a bit like listening to your crazy old uncle tell stories after he's had a few, that is, if you have a crazy old uncle or someone of that sort. I found the middle section about his time on a party yacht with some stingy millionaires and their wild sons to be particularly enjoyable. The pages in this section flew by, but his time in China was a bit more of struggle to read given the daily atrocities and disregard for human life he witnessed and occasionally even perpetrated himself.

All in all I found Don't Call Me a Crook! to be an interesting and amusing memoir. Reading Moore's memoir certainly gives us a hardy sampling of what life could be like in 1920s in a variety of locations. Moore is unapologetic about his thoughts and actions, and so emerges a memoir that, even if not entirely true, still offers an unvarnished and often surprisingly honest-seeming look at life during quite a wild time in our history.

Thanks to Lisa at Online Publicist for providing me with a review copy.

Read other reviews at:

Books I Done Read
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Shanghai Girls by Lisa See

I'm starting to feel really guilty because I read Lisa See's Shanghai Girls and somehow never managed to review it. After a few weeks, I figured enough other folks had reviewed it that my review would just be redundant and unnecessary especially since I was well on my way to forgetting most of the finer details. Then, I thought, hey, not only am I punking out on Random House which so nicely sent me this ARC when I was truly dying to have it, but I'm also screwing myself by not writing a review of a book that would count for not one but two challenges. With that plus the fact that I quite enjoyed the book in mind, I will now attempt to call forth my scant memories to compose a nice half-baked review.


Shanghai Girls is the tale of two sisters, Pearl and May Chin, who work as beautiful girls in pre-war Shanghai. As beautiful girls, they pose for various paintings that become advertisements and calendars, and because of their career, they enjoy a good deal of prestige and freedom. Soon, though, their glory days come to an end as war begins to sweep through their beloved Shanghai at the same time as their father is forced to sell the girls as brides to the sons of a man to whom he owes a large gambling debt. Despite their wishes to remain independent, forces beyond their control demand that they flee Shanghai and embark on the dangerous trip to America to join their husbands who are virtual strangers to them. On arrival they will find both less and more than they could have expected and learn to live with their own secrets and heartbreaks in the process.

Despite owning several of See's much praised other novels, Shanghai Girls is the first of her works that I've actually read. I was not disappointed. See's Shanghai leaps off the page both in its glamour and modernity and its poverty and squalor. She captures its melting pot diversity that results from the many contries dividing the city amongst themsevles as well as the unfortunate underside of its rapid growth. At See's whim we can be either awed or disgusted by the city depending on what the situation demands.

Pearl and May are the most captivating of characters. Their sisterly relationship is excellently rendered in that sometimes they seem to actively dislike each other, but when the chips are down, they are utterly loving and loyal to each other. As they face the reality of life with their strict new in-laws and husbands who they've known for all of one day, it is their evident love for each other that strengthens them and keeps them afloat as they face the many challenges that rise up to meet them in Los Angeles.

See's writing is easy to read and has such an admirable flow that Shanghai Girls proves to be hard to put down. My only minor quibble would be with the ending. It was so abrupt and unexpected that I actually turned the last page totally ignorant that it was the last page. I was sure the story had plenty enough steam to go another few chapters at least and felt a bit left hanging by the unexpected ending. Other than that, however, I was really quite thrilled with Shanghai Girls and look forward to reading more of See's work.

Read other reviews at...

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This Was Supposed To Be a Book Review...

...and maybe it will be once I get to the end of the post. Wait for it...wait for it...

You know, I'm beginning to find my blog ironic. You see, I feel like I'm posting less and less. I review fewer and fewer books and yet more people are following me and subscribing to my feed on Google Reader than ever before - not vastly more, but more nonetheless. I'm pretty sure this is not how it's supposed to work, unless, you people, like me, enjoy the merits of an infrequently updated blog. Some days, I tell you, I do. For one, then my Google Reader doesn't explode with like 50 zillion posts I don't have time to read...like it kind of is exploding now. But then the book blogosphere would be a mighty boring, lame place if everybody blogged like me. What I mean to say is, of course, hello new people and old people, it's a pleasure to have you here reading and commenting and generally being awesome despite my distinct lack of awesomeness.

Today I am contemplating the difficulty, yet again, of reviewing a book that I feel kind of ambivalent about. I pretty much need to review every book I read here because I read like a turtle (and turtles can't even read!) and therefore don't get many books read and therefore don't have many to review. Ah, but it's so hard to be really enthusiastic about reviewing those books that don't naturally create a great feeling of enthusiasm, which is not to say that they're bad, just that they're not super awesometastic enough to jolt me from my general book reviewing laziness.

Also, it's helpful when reviewing books to, um, actually have understood them. This brings me to an informal discussion (but if you're running a challenge that I'm taking part in, we're calling it a book review!) of a book that I barely remember! (This is the part where I attempt to create enthusiasm on both your and my parts with the use of exclamation points!!! Is it working?!?!?)

Anyhow, The Glister by John Burnside. I read it in March, somewhat hungrily devouring its mildly overblown prose thinking that once I reached the end I would understand what it was all about. Like pretty much everyone else whose reviews I have read, I didn't really get it. I thought for a time that maybe I was getting it, but I was fooling myself. I then came upon a sort of problem because I find it hard to frame a review for a book that I didn't understand. Upon reaching the end and trying to formulate some sort of review in my mind, I realized that without at least a basic understanding of what exactly the book was getting at, I don't really have a way to organize or give any sort of theme to my review (imagine that!). Then I realized how important it is to me to have my reviews be cohesive and revolve around some sort of main point, and I don't even know if people or if I even realize I do that. So, this book that would count for two challenges has languished (and languished and languished) on the to be reviewed pile because I'm just...stumped. Ah, but wait, I think I may have something after all...

The Glister is more the story of a town than it is of any one person. Innertown has been decimated by its chemical plant. With the demise of the once successful chemical plant, the town seems to deteriorate and fall in on itself. The plant leaves behind a town populated with ineffectual adults unable to recover from chemical induced ailments or trapped with the grief of losing loved ones and a generation of disaffected children who haunt the abandoned and disintegrating chemical plant property in search of meaning or maybe just a way out of their dismal futures. While the adults seem to be caught up in their own lowgrade misfortune, young boys are disappearing. Instead of seeing this for the problem that it is, all choose to believe that the young teenage boys have simply found a way to escape their fates in Innertown.

I can't tell you much more, except that there's quite a bit of violence, a few teenagers that are actually even h-rnier than you would expect of teenagers, and a good deal of bad language. And this wouldn't have bothered me if it had all added up to something in the end. Instead the book just seems to trail off in yet one more mystery that doesn't seem to make any sense. As it so happens, so much of this book would be promising if only it had all come to something.

If there is indeed a main character for this book, it is Leonard, a teenage boy whose father is dying and whose mother has walked out on them. Leonard's narration crackles and pops with teenage cynicism and wit. He's a good character with a unique and consistent voice. And the atmosphere. The atmosphere in the book is stunning. Burnside manages to create an impression in the reader that Innertown is a place where the sun never shines, where the town's misfortunes cover it like blanket. Even though there are scenes where the sun is actually shining, one can't shake the feeling that this is a place where it is perpetually overcast, and no light shines in. All these things kept me reading in hopes of a fascinating resolution despite my intense dislike of Leonard's freakishly h-rny girlfriend and the various and sundry gratuitous things you would find in an R-rated movie. As you may have guessed, I was ultimately disappointed. The end just doesn't quite come together satisfactorily. It's a little like being led into a maze by someone who knows where they're going and being left halfway through to find your own way out. While I can handle an ambiguous ending, The Glister ultimately leaves too many questions unanswered without so much as a clue to lead its readers to any real resolution.


Hey, wait - I think it is a book review after all! Yay! That was hard. I have to wander off and look at shiny things now. K, bye.

Okay, wait. I've got an ARC of this book that I'd love to unload on the unsuspecting public in hopes that, perhaps, said member of the unsuspecting public could read it and explain it to me. Well, you don't really have to do that if you don't want to, but I'm still giving away the copy. So if you want to have a try at it (now that I've gone to all this trouble convincing you to read it....hardee har har), leave me a comment with your e-mail address. International is okay. I'll draw the name next Saturday, May 16th, so uh, enter before then.

Picking Cotton: Our Memoir of Injustice and Redemption by Jennifer Thompson-Cannino and Ronald Cotton

I've been excited to talk about this book since I finished it, so excited in fact, that I've actually been talking to people about it instead of writing a review. So, I'm going to cut the yammering and try and get straight to the book review today, especially since we've seen so few of such things here lately!


In July 1984, Jennifer Thompson was raped at knifepoint by a black man in her own apartment. With courage and words, she survived and was able to use her memories of the night to bring her rapist to trial. In January 1985, her supposed rapist, Ronald Cotton, was sentenced to life in prison plus fifty years. Eleven long years later he was set free based on DNA evidence that proved that he was innocent of the crime. Now Ronald and Jennifer are what no one would expect - friends.

Picking Cotton is first a brilliant indictment of the flaws in our justice system, flaws based on the inability of humans to ever be completely impartial, completely unprejudiced, and completely able to rely on their memories to perform dependably. It shows that despite our best efforts and intentions, the justice system can and does fail, and when it does, innocent people can surprisingly easily be put in prison for crimes they haven't committed. At the same time, though, Picking Cotton is about a victim, a victim each and every one us can sympathize with. A victim who just desperately wants to see her rapist go to jail so that she can stop existing in a constant terror and start living her life again. A victim who will do anything she can to make that happen, even if it means relying on a faulty memory.

Above all, however, Picking Cotton is a transcendent story of forgiveness. Just as we hear from the victim and easily sympathize with her feelings, we also get the story from the man that she picked, the man that she helped to send to jail for her rape, the wrong man. In his own words, we follow Ronald Cotton through his eleven years of wrongful imprisonment, eleven years in which he managed to stay alive, to stay out of trouble despite being imprisoned with the man who he's certain actually committed the crime that has robbed him of his life, and to never give up hope that the truth would come to light and he would be exonerated. And yet, even after being robbed of eleven years of his life, when Jennifer requests a meeting with him, her heartfelt apology is met with his heartfelt forgiveness making Picking Cotton the story of the the unlikeliest pair of friends that can be imagined.

In her blurb on the front cover, Janet Reno comments on the "human face" this book puts on the many issues facing the justice system, and I couldn't agree more. There are innumerable scholarly books on just such issues, but this book highlights those and does so much more by taking us inside a real story of two people both horribly wronged by the justice system. The writing really flows, the story is raw with the power to completely engage both readers' minds and emotions, and I heartily recommend it to...well...everyone.

Thanks to Anna at Authors on the Web for providing me with a review copy.

Still Here - and *gasp* A Book Review!

I have not been much of a blogger lately. I'm in a sort of funk, I guess. I'm doing things, but they are definitely not the things I normally do. I think part of it is that I've come to a place in my life again where it's time to make some choices and fight against the inertia that seems to hold me in place whenever I spend too much time in my hometown. It's been probably a year and a half of holding what I always imagined would be a nice temporary job in a field so far removed from anything that I ever really wanted to do for a living that it's hardly even funny anymore. I have to make a choice at this point, and I think maybe I've already made it but haven't come to terms with it, about whether I want to take the safe route and have some education paid for by my employer so that I can be something I don't very much want to be but also something that will offer me pretty much definite job security and a decent wage for, well, ever, should I choose to accept. Or whether I need to break loose from this unexpected detour and go back to school or get a job or whatever doing something that I actually have some passion for even if that means taking a pay cut or getting into more debt going to back to school or moving somewhere else and trying to make a go of it again just scraping by. I think I know what I want, but I also don't much trust myself as I don't seem to be a good hand at making decisions. At least not in my own view. So, yes, I'm in a bit of a "Now what should I do with my life?" funk where I have to decide if it would be complete idiocy to turn down a very viable opportunity just because that career path doesn't call out to me...

So I've been thinking a lot. I've been working a lot. It got warmer here, and so I've been walking a lot. And watching this this stupid show that I swore to myself I wouldn't get hooked on this year because it's such an incredible time suck, but I can't seem to make myself stop caring once I've watched a show or two. And on Thursday I had to chase a lost bird out of my house, but that's another story for another time.

In doing all these other things, I've failed to muster any enthusiasm for reviewing books, but I really should because, despite the fact that I read like a turtle (okay, maybe a little better than a turtle - turtles don't really read, you know), I'm getting woefully behind.

So today, I bring to you a selection provided by LibraryThing Early Reviewers - yet another of those that the "oooh, shiny free book" went to my clicking finger before my brain caught up. I didn't realize it, but it's Christian fiction. I try to avoid such stuff when reviews are called for because I don't have a good track record with it despite actually being a Christian, and it's usually nice to pick for review books that I, you know, might actually like. Nonetheless, the TBR randomizer chose it for me out of all the languishing ARCs and I read it. I wasn't totally blown away, but you know, I didn't hate it. In fact, I rather enjoyed it at points, but here, let me get to the real thing here.

It's 1975 and Amy Monteiro, a slightly high-strung Christian teenager, has but two goals in life and they are to start her life at college in California and leave her irresponsible mother behind. Imagine her frustration, then, when her mother decides to accompany her in her move to California compounded even further when she finds herself stranded in the one-horse town of Cordial, Colorado waiting for a replacement transmission for her mother's beloved Pontiac. Summer stretches out forever for Amy as she settles into her new job working for the pious if not exactly Christian Mrs. Clancy at Clancy and Sons Funeral Home dealing with "death calls" and being generally creeped out by the thought of dead bodies in the basement. Even while Amy sets about making contingency plans for her escape to California, with or without her mother, the many and sundry people of Cordial are slowly breaking down Amy's walls and teaching her lessons about her life and her God that will last far beyond her summer within the town limits.

I had ambiguous feelings about Patti Hill's The Queen of Sleepy Eye. I will, however, say that it was better than I expected it to be. It does suffer somewhat from what I would say is a typical problem of Christian fiction based on what I've read. It favors message over writing. Hill gets her quite valid points across well, but there's a certain artlessness to the writing. A bit more telling than showing, dialogue that feels stiff and contrived on occasion. That said, though, I did enjoy this story. Hill certainly has a knack for storytelling and the pages went by without my even noticing. She has populated her small Colorado town with characters that might at first seem a bit on the cookie cutter side but ultimately develop into lovable, if flawed, people that the reader can really sympathize with. I noted the points Hill was making with her story, but I never felt like I was simply being "preached to" instead of being told a story.

Overall, I wouldn't say that The Queen of Sleepy Eye will make my short list for top reads of the year, but it is a sweet and very readable story about growing up that reminds Christians that, at the end of the day, what we really need is grace and that God has a limitless quantity to offer.

Canvey Island by James Runcie

All right, so here it is. The book that derailed my healthy reading pace and kept my January reading numbers firmly in "look at this and want to jump off a bridge" range. It came in the mail and it was all new and sparkly and it smelled good and it had a cover and pages that were thicker and more pleasing to the touch than your average ARC. Even those things would not normally be enough to divert me from my standard purposes, but then it started with this paragraph (and no, I haven't checked it against the completed work - sorry):

I know the fear of death is always with us but sometimes it can disappear for days. You don't think about it when your wife is coming to bed and she takes off her nightgown and you're excited by her nakedness even if you have been married a long time. You don't think about it when your child gives you a smile that you know is meant only for you or when the sea is dead calm and you're out fishing with no one to trouble you. You don't think about death, of course you don't, it never crosses your mind, but then back it comes, far too soon, telling you not to be so cocky, don't think this is going to last, mate, this is all the happiness you're going to get and you should be grateful I didn't come before.

Yeah, I know, right? It's a pretty good paragraph, so tantalizing in fact, that in a weak moment I cast aside my barely started copy of Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet, a book that is apparently actually really good, in favor of James Runcie's Canvey Island freshly arrived after being awarded to me by Library Thing Early Reviewers in, I believe, November. Oh, but let's stem the tide of my mild bitterness and get on with the "real" review.

Canvey Island is, primarily, the story of Martin Turner, who, as a young boy, lost his mother to a deadly flood while his father and aunt were away dancing on the mainland. The moment his mother is in the ground, Martin's father and Aunt Violet become a little too close than seems decent. All of this, of course, leaves an indelible impression on young Martin who soon decides that his chief end in life will be to "stop water." Single-minded in the pursuit of this goal, Martin departs for Cambridge to study water engineering forsaking his girlfriend Linda, the only real love he has ever known since his mother passed. Afraid that loving someone so much will only lead to more heartache if she were ever lost to him and caught up in his ambitions for the future away from the island, Martin turns his back on Linda in favor of another girl who rivals his ambition in her own way. Claire is a rebellious vicar's daughter whose commitment to feminism, social change, and one especially notable peace camp rally trumps her commitment to Martin and their daughter Lucy. Each ceaselessly driven by their ever-elusive goals, the two drive each other away, and Martin ultimately finds himself back on Canvey Island, the very place that he was so desperate to leave behind, seeking the same things that eluded him even in the wider world.

For a guy who lost his mother at a tender young age only to find his father getting together with his shallow, somewhat irritating aunt, Martin was a remarkably unsympathetic character. The rather stiff, over-literary writing style peppered with moments of unrealistic overthinking on the parts of the narrators seems designed to prevent one's ever getting close to the characters but for a few unexpected moments, none of which take place in Martin's narration. All of these characters should be sympathetic. They've lost their sister, their wife, their mother. They don't understand their places in the world. They made decisions in war time that might have caused unnecessary death. Their husbands love other women much more than they love their wives. These are people living lives that are average but hard, lives that might easily speak to our own experiences, and in most other books their plights would speak to readers' hearts, but these narrators, for the most part, seem so very hollow.

Speaking of narration then, let's talk for a moment about narrators. Canvey Island has a bunch of them, around six, it seems, of varying importance and strikingly little differentiation in the voices. When done with flair and pizazz, multiple narrators can be great and give an amazing depth to characters and plot alike as in another "island" book Small Island by Andrea Levy. Unfortunately, though, it seems more often that authors undertaking to present the points of view of a vast array of narrators confuse readers and fail to even give one of them a unique and convincing voice. Such is the case with Canvey Island. Present are the points of view of Martin, his wife Claire, his lover Linda, his Uncle George, his Aunt Violet, and his father, Len. Their voices aren't ever especially different, and the narration appears to change for no apparent reason and to no apparent benefit. Cases in point are chapters when Runcie switches between Martin and say, Linda, midway through a conversation. You note, of course, that the beginning of the section is marked "Linda," but find that you're totally baffled at the accumulating "I saids" and "He saids" that pervade the mostly dialogue-based chapter in which the narrator is of little consequence anyway. To be quite frank, Martin and his family and his problems and total inability to ever be fulfilled by anything were, well, boring.

Canvey Island has an interesting premise, a beautiful cover, and just the sort of first paragraph that would scream "take me home" if you happened upon it while browsing bookstore shelves. Unfortunately, the story itself fails to live up to its great promise.


Okay, so, I realize this is probably one of the more ornery reviews I've written in quite some time, so if you happen to review this book more positively than I have (or even just as negatively as I have), do leave a link and I'll be happy to post it and give people a contrasting viewpoint to this, um, unhappy outpouring. Perhaps it's that I'm feeling particularly blunt this week which I'm a bit afraid is going to get me in trouble in more places than one... Anyhow, it looks like the jury's still out on this one with the public at large, but the folks from some British periodicals apparently quite liked it - though by and large their praise seems to include some variation on the theme of "understated" which is quite right, in my opinion, except for not in an especially good way.

The School of Essential Ingredients by Erica Bauermeister

Wow, it's been a slow week in blogland for me, which is bad because it seems that everybody else is really back in the bloggy swing of things. Blogland is in full swing and so's the workload at my job where it seems like we were busier than ever this week. Every day I try to sit down and read what everybody's writing and rarely get very far before getting distracted by all of life's have tos (and a few of those pesky other want tos, too). It all reminds me of why I've always been (and continue to be despite my best efforts) a big old lurker. All this commenting stuff makes this bloghopping take so much longer. Yet it would be a bizarre contradiction if I stopped taking the time to comment in the name of getting through the posts in my Google reader quicker, no?

Is anybody starting to get the feeling that the brief personal interludes at the beginning of most of my posts with actual content are merely serving to get me into the flow of writing? Because I'm pretty sure that's why I do this. Or else I'm just dragging my feet without really knowing why. Anywho, I'm all warmed up now, so on to the good stuff...

I finished a great book last weekend and my first read that will be released this year. It was one of those books that was fully satisfying and one that I knew that I would be recommending before I even came close to turning the last page. Any book that can make me forget that A) it's snowing outside and B) I'm sitting on a rock hard kitchen chair that's really making my back hurt for a considerable amount of time definitely gets my vote. Now the irony in all this is that, uh, I don't even remember requesting this ARC. Terrible, right? It arrived in the mail, and I was like...I chose this? I guess it sounds good, but when did I choose this? Oh well, all's well that ends well, and this book certainly does!


The book in question, of course, is Erica Bauermeister's debut novel The School of Essential Ingredients. Lillian recognizes from an early age that food is powerful. For Lillian, flavors can heal, spices can seduce, and even an ordinary apple can be magical for someone who eats it at just the right moment. During a monthly cooking class at her restaurant, Lillian sets out to show that cooking is much more than simply following directions in a recipe and eating is much more than a practical action to stave off hunger. As her students come from their seperate walks of life, each of their personal stories is illuminated and each of their lives is impacted by lessons they learn under Lillian's perceptive tutelage, lessons that extend far beyond how to bake a good cake or prepare Thanksgiving dinner. Slowly but surely, Lillian's students come to discover the power of a good meal to bring people together, to heal past hurts, and to alter the course of current struggles.

She saw that cookies that were soft and warm satisfied a different human need than those that were crisp and cooled. The more she cooked, the more she began to view spices as carriers of the emotions and memories of the places they were originally from and all those they had traveled through over the years. She discovered that people seemed to react to spices much as they did to other people, relaxing instinctively into some, shivering into a kind of emotional rigor mortis when encountering others.

The School of Essential Ingredients is a briliant blend of the obvious and the subtle just like the flavors that change the lives of Bauermeister's characters. Bauermeister's writing is a rare and sensual treat as her writing brings scents, flavors, and textures to life right alongside the poignantly rendered moments in the lives of each of the characters. Each of the students is fleshed out and all are having experiences that it is easy for the reader to relate to their own life. Their stories are both sweet and sad, but above all, genuine. Bauermeister's debut is a delicious story about food, about love, and about life that left me totally satisfied, even as I wiped a tear or two from my eye.

The frosting was a thick buttercream, rich as a satin dress laid against the firm, fragile texture of the cake. With each bite, the cake melted first, then the frosting, one after another, like lovers tumbling into bed.



That's two for two on books making me cry in 2009 which is actually a highly unusual event. And I should have written this review right after I finished the book instead of now when the afterglow has worn off in the face of a week of hard work - then maybe it would not be so feeble - though it is admirably concise, for me. *sigh* I loved this book a lot more than it seems like from the review, mmkay?

The School of Essential Ingredients will be available where books are sold on January 22, 2009. And have I mentioned that it was really, really good?

Read other reviews at:

Worducopia
A Reader's Respite
Books and Cooks

The Longest Trip Home by John Grogan

I'm sitting down to review this book, and I'm thinking about a book store. A certain big name bookstore that I'm thinking of (One word! Starts with a "B"!), as some may know, has no established biography/memoir section. Instead, it haphazardly lumps its memoirs and biographies among its other categories which, is, for all intensive purposes, abysmal. If it's a person associated with music - you'll find that biography amid books about learning to play the guitar and the like. Literary figures' biographies/memoirs fall under the literature and fiction category of the store despite being neither (though this categorization is, perhaps, closer the mark) - likewise are filed the memoirs of people with no fame or preconceived notions to draw on. This practice leads to memoirs popping up in the unlikeliest of places with little or no attention to subject matter when it comes to categorization, only a passing thought to what the author or figure might be associated with.

Imagine my utter lack of surprise, then, while browsing at this store's little brother store to find The Longest Trip Home, a humorous and touching depiction of John Grogan's rather ordinary life nestled among the rest of the books in the - can you guess it? - animal section. But for a passing mention of a childhood pet and, of course, a brief mention of the infamous Marley that has little to no bearing on the rest of the memoir, this book has nothing at all to do with animals. While I love this store, this is one of the more irritating things about it. What a disservice they are doing to this book and many like it by mercilessly mis-categorizing them in order to avoid doing something so practical as creating a memoir/biography section which customers are often asking for leaving booksellers blundering about in their attempts to explain why so large a bookstore would fail to have such a section. Hiding books where no one would guess they would be and creating an impression that a book should have a certain subject matter that it really doesn't contain certainly doesn't do authors or readers any favors.

But, that's enough of me on my soapbox. I've got a book to review here, you know?


In The Longest Trip Home, John Grogan maps his journey from his idyllic suburban childhood with his fiercely Catholic parents into his adulthood as a journalist attempting to reconcile his own worldview with his parents' faith. Grogan's childhood in suburban Detroit is the epitome of everything his Catholic parents didn't have in their own childhoods' and wished for their children to have. Their chosen neighborhood is full of green backyards, features a private beach of sorts shared by the whole neighborhood, and most importantly contains a Catholic school to educate their four children.

Grogan's childhood is marked by his rebellions both small and large against his parents' rigidly held but well-intentioned Catholic morals. Though Grogan loves and respects his parents and sees them for the good people they are despite and perhaps because of their pious meddling, he can't seem to grasp their faith. Nonetheless, he paves over his indiscretions and lack of belief with lies big and small until, as he grows older and leaves for college, he realizes that he is living two lives in a desperate attempt not to disappoint the people he loves most. When the truth begins to come out, John and his parents will have to find away to cross the divide between his two lives.

The Longest Trip Home is a finely wrought tale of growing up. Grogan's anecdotes of his childhood and teenage antics as well as his pleas to God to deliver him from the consequence of his comical missteps are laugh out loud funny. Much more profound, though, is his chronicle of growing up and beginning to understand his parents for who they are and to understand himself in what he cannot share with them. Even so, his story is filled with the love and respect he has for his parents both as a child under their discipline and as an adult who knows that he will never share the intense faith that pervades his parents' lives. Grogan's story comes full circle as he returns, with his brothers and sister, to sit at his father's death bed, and it is here that the book is at its most powerful. John's last moments with his father are rendered so poignantly that I found myself crying as if I knew them both personally. Grogan's memoir is a quiet but powerful tale of what would be an ordinary life and an ordinary family were they not made extraordinary by their great love and Grogan's exemplary writing.

Standing there, I thought about spring's glide into summer, and summer's march to autumn, and the reliable promise of dawn in every setting sun. I thought about the old maple tree that fell in the yard and the young garden that flourished in its footprint. Mostly I thought about Dad and the exemplary life he had led - and, for all our differences, the indelible mark he had left on me.

This book was released in October 2008, and if you're looking for it at *cough*Borders*ahem, cough, cough* you can find it in the "Animal" section. ;-)

The 2009 ARC Reading Challenge

Teddy has brought back the ARC reading challenge which I joined (and failed at!) last year. This year it's an all year event that requires us to list all the ARCs, which are defined as "anything sent from a publisher or author with the expectation that we will review them," in our possession and should we have over 12, we should read and review 12 within the year to meet the requirements of the challenge.

Suffice it to say that I have well over 12, so I will be reading 12 (hopefully *more*!). Here comes the really unpleasant part - the listing of the "ARCs" in my possession.

1. In the Country of Brooklyn by Peter Golenbock
2. The Longest Trip Home by John Grogan Review
3. Franklin and Lucy by Joseph E. Persico
4. Hurry Down Sunshine by Michael Greenberg
5. The Lace Reader by Brunonia Barry
6. The White Mary by Kira Salak
7. Stealing Athena by Karen Essex
8. Apples and Oranges by Marie Brenner
9. The Queen of Sleepy Eye by Patti Hill Review
10. The Glimmer Palace by Beatrice Colin
11. Resistance by Agnes Humbert
12. Guernica by Dave Boling
13. Stalin's Children by Owen Matthews
14. Heavier Than Air by Nona Caspers
15. The Painter From Shanghai by Jennifer Cody Epstein
16. The School of Essential Ingredients by Erica Bauermeister Review
17. The Glister by John Burnside Review
18. The Mighty Queens of Freeville by Amy Dickinson
19. The Fireman's Wife by Jack Riggs Review
20. Joker One by Donovan Campbell
21. American Rust by Philipp Meyer
22. The Weight of a Mustard Seed by Wendell Steavenson
23. Something Like Beautiful by Asha Bandele
24. The Lost City of Z by David Grann
25. The Belivers by Zoe Heller
26. Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet by Jamie Ford
27. Canvey Island by James Runcie Review
28. Outcasts United by Warren St. John
29. When Skateboards Will Be Free by Said Sayrafiezadeh
30. Land of Marvels by Barry Unsworth
31. Unpolished Gem by Alice Pung
32. Baby Jesus Pawn Shop by Lucia Orth
33. Picking Cotton: Our Memoir of Injustice and Redmption by Jennifer Thompson-Cannino and Ronald Cotton Review
34. Shanghai Girls by Lisa See Review
35. Don't Call Me a Crook by Bob Moore Review
36. Strength in What Remains by Tracy Kidder
37. The Wish Maker by Ali Sethi
38. First Comes Love, Then Comes Malaria by Eve Browne-Waite Review
39. Stone's Fall by Iain Pears
40. The Blue Notebook by James Levine
41. The Angel's Game by Carlos Ruiz Zafon
42. Rooftops of Tehran by Mahbod Seraji
43. The Well and the Mine by Gin Phillips Review
44. Sacred Hearts by Sarah Dunant
45. Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout
46. The Texicans by Nina Vida Review
47. The Crying Tree by Naseem Rakha
48. The Rapture by Liz Jensen
49. South of Broad by Pat Conroy
50. The Invention of Everything Else by Smantha Hunt
51. Homer's Odyssey by Gwen Cooper
52. Family Sentence by Jeanine Cornillot
53. Black Angels by Linda Beatrice Brown
54. The Killing Circle by Andrew Pyper
55. The Information Officer by Mark Mills
56. The Geography of Love by Glenda Burgess