“A Wilder Rose” Book Review

A Wilder Rose
by Susan Wittig Albert
Lake Union Publishing

$14.95 US
March 17, 2015
ISBN 9781477849606
4/5 starsI received an advanced reviewer’s copy/galley from Lake Union Publishing on NetGalley.*  This book will be released in a new edition on March 17, 2015, and it attracted my attention not only because of the subject matter, but also because of the author – Susan Wittig Albert.  I have read many of her mystery novels over the years, and have particularly enjoyed her China Bayles series.

“A Wilder Rose” is a fictionalized account of the life of Rose Wilder, the only surviving daughter of Laura Ingalls Wilder, and Rose’s secret involvement in the publication of her mother’s famous series of books based upon a pioneering childhoood in the Midwest.  It is told in flashbacks by a latter-day Rose to a friend of hers, explaining why she is working on a revision of one of Laura’s books, even though Rose’s involvement is publicly minimized and Rose’s name does not appear as a co-author of the series.  In the process of her explanations, we learn a great deal about Rose’s childhood, travels, and success as a writer before working on Laura’s material.

What is presented is a very interesting portrait of an independent, self-sufficient feminist Rose before, during, and after the period of the Great Depression.  Given the time period, it is at times quite a melancholy story of financial struggles and instability, that is overcome by perseverance and hard work.  Much like the story told in Laura’s “Little House” books (whether Rose does or does not acknowledge the similarity.)  Perhaps more disturbing to readers might be the difficultIes portrayed in the relationship between mother and daughter, and Rose’s struggles to distance herself, both physically and emotionally, from Laura.

I am a big fan of the books, and my initial (predictable) reaction was “how could anyone want to distance themselves from Laura Ingalls Wilder”?  But of course, in considering the difficulties that arise between most parents and children, and the urge of every child to leave home, explore the world, and freely live their own lives, it is not all surprising.  And no one is to blame.  The author successfully illustrates the similar tensions that existed between Laura and her own mother Caroline, as well as Rose and her sort-of adopted son John, which reminds us that this tension is likely not based upon any particular conduct of anyone, but rather, simply due to common parent-child dynamics.

I point this out to illustrate that even though this is not a very sugar-coated fantasy about being the only daughter of Laura Ingalls Wilder, neither is it a bashing of Laura Ingalls Wilder – this is not “Mommie Dearest”!  It is a well-written, and interesting story that is fascinating in its discussion of the publishing world during this time period, and the efforts of two women to write their own stories.  It was a very enjoyable read for me.

* All opinions are my own, any advanced reader’s copy or galley does not effect my review.

Best Books of 2015 So Far . . .

The Kite Runner

by Khaled Hosseini
400 pages
$16.00 US
ISBN 9781594631931

The Bluest Eye

by Toni Morrison

224 pages
$14.00 US
ISBN 9780307278449

I realize that it is only the second week of March, but I was lucky enough to read some incredible books already this year.  So. . .drumroll. . .the first installment of the Best Books of 2015 So Far!  I read a total of twenty-three books during January and February, and quite a lot of them were very good books.  Probably because my to-be-read (TBR) pile was (is) so large that statistically, it cannot help but include some big winners.  My top 4 so far are: “The Kite Runner” by Khaled Hosseini; “The Bluest Eye” by Toni Morrison; “The Robber Bride” by Margaret Atwood; and “Sputnik Sweetheart” by Haruki Murakami.

When I read these four books, they knocked me out of my seat.  First, let me say that most of these contain some disturbing scenes and plot lines, so it feels a bit strange to say that I “loved” them.  Maybe it is that my vocabulary that isn’t well-developed enough. Or perhaps it is just a fault of every bibliophile’s language – we love that a book makes us recoil, rage against unjust events, and breaks our hearts.  Especially when in the hands of a writer so gifted that you can be seduced into the narrative, and pulled along seemingly against your will.  All of these books did that for me.  Today’s review concerns “The Kite Runner and “The Bluest Eye,” and the next installment will discuss “The Robber Bride” and “Sputnik Sweetheart.”

In “The Kite Runner,” the protagonist is Amir, who we follow during his childhood in Afghanistan, during his emigration with his father to the United States, and his return to Afghanistan in an attempt to heal the relationship with his childhood friend Hassan.  One of the many interesting dynamics of this friendship is that Amir’s friend was his servant, but we also discover additional information regarding the ties between Amir and Hassan later in the novel.  The story begins in Afghanistan in 1975, when the country is ruled by a monarchy, and the narrative continues to early in 2002.

Hosseini, in his first novel, beautifully describes the larger issues of class distinctions, religious differences, and the experience of emigrating to another country.  Astoundingly, Hosseini also manages to convey a great deal of information regarding Afghanistan during this time period, without sounding preachy, or being at all dry.  But just as beautifully, it describes family relationships, and the betrayal of friends.  Just not in the way you would necessarily expect.  It is one of those books where you love two characters and know that something awful is about to pass between them, to the point where you actually begin saying “no!” out loud.  This book contains all that is beautiful, and all that is terrifying, in human nature.  It is a book that I will always recommend be read at least once, by as many people as possible.

The next book I am recommending today is “The Bluest Eye” by Toni Morrison.  I was recently asked by someone to summarize in one or two sentences, at the most, why I recommend this book.  Here is the response that I gave: “I love this book, which may sound like a strange thing to say given the terrible things that Pecola endures. In my opinion, it is a very moving account of discrimination and marginalization, economic enslavement subsequent to literal slavery, and the ways in which humanity abuses one another, but written in such beautiful prose that you can’t stop reading it, even if you wanted to.”  It sounds similar to my review of “The Kite Runner” doesn’t it?  I had not planned to read these books so close together in time, but that is what happened.

This year, I decided that I would make an effort to read several authors in particular – Toni Morrison, Margaret Atwood, and Haruki Murakami.  That isn’t asking much, right?  (Of course, I will be reading many other authors and books, and I worry that I sound like a book snob saying that I wanted to make an effort with these three.  I hope I don’t sound like that.)  I started with Morrison because a couple of years ago, I was driving to a work appointment when I suddenly realized that I was driving down the block of homes where Toni Morrison was living.  I pulled over and stopped the car for a minute, which seems like a crazy stalker sort of thing to do.  But when the realization hit me as to where I was, I took a minute to think about my life, her life, and just – life.  So that is how strongly I felt about Ms. Morrison before I even began reading this book.

And when I began reading “The Bluest Eye,” it was so intense that I immediately felt like I was running down a street with Morrison, being chased by a pack of dogs, until we finished the book.  “The Bluest Eye” was the first published novel by Toni Morrison, and it tells the story of eleven year-old Pecola, who is a black child living in Ohio in 1941. Her story is told by her own thoughts, as well as those of the people with whom she interacts – other children, parents, shopkeepers, and neighbors.  Pecola’s strongest wish is that she could change her eye color from brown to blue, because the pretty blue-eyed girls seem to be more loved and accepted by everyone.  It already sounds heart-breaking, doesn’t it, but in our journey we learn quite a few other things about Pecola that are even more distressing.

In telling Pecola’s story, Morrison easily causes us to be both repulsed by certain characters, and to recognize ourselves in others.  In my darker, more frustrated moments, I have sounded like Mama during her “three quarts of milk” rant, after someone drank all of family’s milk.  Ouch.  I have now tried to be more watchful of my ranting.  Books change you.  Books should change you.  In my opinion, at least.

It also made me think about an incident that happened when I was ten or eleven years old and living in Texas.  Our class in school went away to a camp in a rural area, maybe because we lived in an urban area. I can’t remember why.  But I do remember trying to sleep the first night.  My hair was still blonde (but my eyes were brown.)  As I was lying in the bunk bed, two girls from a different school, and who I had never seen before, held me down and dug their fingernails into my scalp until it bled, and ripped out some of my hair by the roots. I kept screaming until finally a girl from my class came over and hit the other girls until they stopped. Then she crawled into my bed to protect me for the rest of the night.  She was so brave, and I learned a lot about courage from her.  For many months, maybe even a year or so, I would get scabs in my scalp that would fall off and then form again, in a cycle that I was worried would never end. I brushed my hair over them so no one would see.  My point is that I never really understood why those girls did it.  I didn’t think much about it, I just tried to put it behind me.  But now I may have a better understanding of why, and my heart breaks for them, as it does for Pecola.  I hope they had a better experience in life than she did.

This is my way of saying that I felt moved, and not just touched, by this book.  (See Toni Morrison’s “Forward” for more on this topic.)  This is an amazing book, that I wish everyone would read.  Multiple times, at different ages and stages of life.

So these are my two reviews for today.  What are your favorite books of the year so far?  Is there a books that has changed you?  Let me know in the comments!

Small Mercies Book Review

Small Mercies

by Eddie Joyce
Release Date March 10, 2015
Viking Books
$27.95

I received an advanced reader’s copy of this book from Viking Books.*  This is the author’s first novel, and it was a compelling read for me.  Although, like most novels, it has its flaws, I never considered putting it down or not finishing it.  The book is a character-driven look into the life of an Italian-American Staten Island family, ten years after the 9/11/2001 loss of their firefighter relative (“Bobby”) at the World Trade Center.  As you would expect, it is a very moving story, and is told by characters who each react in their individual ways to a life that is missing a family member, and their having to share their grief with the rest of the world.

The plot develops over the course of one week, and is told by multiple points of view – mother, father, wife, and two brothers.  Each point of view is developed in a separate section of the book, so there are no abrupt shifts into the mind of another character, and it is always clear whose eyes we are seeing out of.  In this sense, the writing is very clear, and does not suffer from the confusion that can result in a narrative told from multiple points of view.

In addition, there are some memorable turns of phrase, such as the “Yo, fat man fucked you up” that has now been entered in my book journal as a favorite quote, and made me laugh abruptly and, yes, out loud.  For me, there was too much lawyering, and too much detail regarding basketball pool betting strategies and the playing of basketball.  These details, obviously, did not ruin the book for me.  I just would have a liked a bit less of them.  Overall, I very much enjoyed the writing style of the narrative.

The only portions of the book that did not feel as authentic, to me, were a few of the instances wherein a female character is expressing her sexuality.  This was not due to any perceived vulgarity on my part, I am a fan of vulgar language.  And it was not their desires that were off-putting, but rather that they sounded inconsistent with the character’s prior language and thought processes.

I also would have welcomed more descriptions of the grief process of Gail, the mother of Bobby.  Even though the author gives us more of Gail than some of the other characters (particularly the brother Franky), I would have appreciated more description of Gail’s reaction between the day or two of hearing about Bobby’s death, and the jump to ten years later.

Lastly and importantly, there should be a warning that the racism expressed is quite unnerving, as it is written.  The racism of the characters is directed toward many peoples and nationalities, thus offending a great portion of the human population.  However, it seems clear that the author is attempting to make a statement about the characters in this time and this place, and their reactions to the changing of “their” world.  But it feels that we are not given enough to establish the author’s disapproval of such behavior, and such language, or that perhaps not all long-term residents of Staten Island share these same beliefs.  In other words, there is a danger of such offensive language eclipsing what the author was trying to achieve.

That being said, this story of a family’s change and, in some instances, failure to adapt to loss, feels intimate, personal, and touching.  The descriptions of both moving on, and failing to move on, with their lives is well-done and enjoyable.  It deserves a re-read.

*All opinions are my own, any advanced reader’s copy or galley does not effect my review.

Welcome!

Welcome, reader, to my blog about books!  A trite but true phrase – I am a life-long lover of books.  And it appears that I may have more years behind me than most reviewers on BookTube, so perhaps this is true about bloggers as well!  I love books in general: fiction, non-fiction, classics, contemporary fiction, science fiction, literary fiction, young adult fiction, historical fiction.  Essentially, I will read anything that sounds interesting to me, at the time.  So there should be a wide variety of books discussed here. If the current book is not your type, be sure to visit again, yours may be up next.
Before we get started, a small warning – I do not consider myself an expert in grammar, literature, or in the art of criticism.  Therefore, there may (will) be instances in which my language is less than ideal, or my humor falls flat.  But it will never be my intention to be cruel or unnecessarily harsh.  My thoughts may not be original, in the sense that someone else has expressed a similar thought in the past.  But they will always be my own!  If I am referencing another’s creation, proper attribution will be made.

One of my favorite quotes is “There is nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed.” – Ernest Hemingway.  To a lesser degree, this also applies to reviewing books.  The answers to such questions as “why do I like this book,” or “why did this part bother me,” are quite personal and revealing.  But this is the beauty of books, and of writing.  Their meaning can appear to change with the reader, and with the passage of time.  There is no static book.  Or – there shouldn’t be.  And the writer loses the sense of control over the creation, as it evolves into its own being.  Frightening, but a necessary and perhaps inevitable process.

So again, I welcome you, and hope that you find something of interest here. Cheers!