Rules of Civility by Amor Towles

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Little did Katey know that when she and her best friend, Evey, went out to ring in the new year of 1938 that she’d  be ringing in a new relationship that would introduce her to the moneyed Upper East Side social scene of New York City.  Meeting people with names like Tinker and Bitsy, Katey gets drawn into this scene, even as she continues to work her own way up the business ladder, using her wiles and wit.  But while Katey does hold onto her scruples – or her own rules of civility , if you will – she does become tangled in a web of love triangles that both highlight and transcend social class status.

There is so much to be said about this book.  Most importantly, the writing just downright beautiful.  This prose by Towles often verges on the poetic.  The phrasing and the images that are drawn with words are so vivid that I was forced to read some passages multiple times, just to really appreciate them fully.  The author has a true gift that he is generously sharing with us here.

The characters are also so gracefully drawn.  From their subtle tics to their happy or hapless (depending on the character) wit, you cannot help feeling compassion for each and every one of them.  And each and every one of them is neither all good or all bad – much like the real world.  And Katey is the kind, vulnerable, and yet steady heroine we all aspire to being.

What I appreciate most about this book is the underlying current of friction between money and honor.   As Katey mixes more with those of the upper class, she sees some who feel they should earn the money they have and others who feel they just deserve it.  And in this era of Trump and the Republican Party’s shameful and frightening abuse of both money and power, the statement of honor and kindness triumphing over greed in this story is particularly poignant.

A lyrical and delightful book – highly recommend!

 

Lilac Girls by Martha Hall Kelly

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Wow.  I just finished this book and I’m still breathless…

Caroline is a young debutante who has given up her acting career to volunteer to help French families who have just come to resettle in NYC in the late 1930’s. Herta is an ambitious physician, one of the few women doctors, in fact, in Germany in 1939.  And Kasia is a teenager who, in 1939 decides she will join her crush, Pietrik, and deliver packages for the Polish underground, after the invasion of the Germans.  As you might expect, these very different women’s lives eventually intersect as the tragedies of the second World War drive them together.

What is most staggering is that this story is based on the lives of real people and real events.  Both Caroline and Herta were real women, individuals who exemplified the best and the worst that women could be.  And Ravensbruck, the Nazi concentration camp for women, was frighteningly real as well.  What fills in the connections between the two women is historical fiction based on years of research by the author to create a story that also illustrates the best and the worst that people can be.

The writing is excellent.  The way the plot is drawn, circling among the 3 major characters, is great not only in terms of fortifying the opposing narratives, but also in building up and then releasing tension as well.  When parts become almost too painful to read, the story switches back to a lighter mood to give the reader a much deserved break.  (What I always feel guilty about is that what I find too hard to read about – millions of people – literally, millions! – actually lived.)

What was most horrifying – and I hate to bring this up, but I feel compelled – is that sentences in this book that described Hitler were frighteningly identical to those describing our new president of the United Staes.  The ego, the destruction of anyone who disagreed with him, and the paranoia with which he reigned – it was all too familiar.  That is terrifying. But all the more reason to read books like this one:  ones that remind us how far people can really go.  It reminds us not to be complacent, because people in Germany thought that it could never happen there either.

This is a MUST READ, by any measure!

A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles

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We meet Count Alexander Rustov in June of 1922, as he is pronounced guilty of having written a poem that was felt to incite potential action against the Kremlin.  He is sentenced to house arrest, but as it happens, his “house” is the Metropol Hotel, one of Moscow’s finest international hotels.  As he is resettled into a much smaller room than the one to which he’s grown accustomed, he adjusts his life and his expectations to the confines of his restricted quarters.  When he very soon meets a young girl of 9 years named Nina, his life changes dramatically and he learns that life can lead you in very unexpected directions even when you cannot leave the very confines of your home.

The writing in this book is absolutely gorgeous.  While the story is related with the lofty verbiage to which a count of Rustov’s caliber and sophistication is accustomed, Amor Towles blends wit and warmth  with such mastery that the result has the reader smiling throughout the many pages of this book.  Here is an example of the imagery that is used so brilliantly:

“Like the wheeling of the stars…  That is how time passes when one is left waiting unaccountably.  The minutes relentless.  And the seconds?  Why, not only does every last one of them demand its moment in the stage, it insists upon making a soliloquy full of weighty pauses and artful hesitations and then leaps into an encore at the slightest hint of applause.” (P 353)

In addition, each of the characters adds much color to the palate of this book.  As Alexander insinuates himself into the inner workings of the hotel, he befriends staff and guests alike, and the reader has the pleasure of their company as well.  The setting inside the hotel also gives the reader an appreciation of the interplay between Russian international relations and the insular attitude of communism.

I don’t often categorize books as “Must Reads” because I feel this should be kept exclusive, but I’m doing it here.  A Gentleman in Moscow is absolutely a “MUST READ!”

Along the Infinite Sea by Beatriz Williams

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Another absolute winner by this gifted writer!

Pepper Schuyler certainly has her reasons for selling the 1936 Special Roadster Mercedes Benz she’s been working on restoring, but she can’t imagine why the mysterious Annabelle Dommerich was so intent on buying it, and for such a small fortune.  To learn why, the author takes us back and forth between the relative “present” (1966) and the past (1935-) in the telling of the story.  We learn that Annabelle has had to navigate a passionate love for a Jewish German man at the start of the Nazi uprising.  Her complicated history has lead her inextricably back to this car and to Pepper, with whom she will share more in common than Pepper would have ever predicted.

 

Beatriz Williams has a way of creating characters whom you just want to invite over for a drink and conversation.  Her female characters are smart and sharp-witted and yet hopeful and strong.  In addition, she crafts her plots with twists and turns and actually keeps the suspense maintained throughout the pages.  This is a book that you can’t stop but yet don’t want to finish reading, because you just want to stay in the world of these real-life, endearing characters.

Highly recommend this and can’t wait to read other books by her!  (This is my 3rd by her,  I believe.)

Small Great Things by Jodi Picoult

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Love seems to actually trump hate in this frighteningly timely novel by Jodi Picoult.   It begins when a Black labor and delivery nurse, Ruth, begins to care for the baby of a White supremacist couple and the couple insist that she be removed from their case because of her race. As it would happen, Ruth is alone with the baby when the baby stops breathing.  Should she touch the baby and save him, as she is trained to do?  Should she abide by the racist rules the hospital has imposed at the request of this repugnant couple?  What happens next sets Ruth and the couple and ultimately, Ruth’s lawyer, Kennedy, on a road to grappling with race as it is seen from all perspectives.

Little did I know that I’d be reading this amidst the worst campaign and most devastating election outcome in the history of the United States.  The spillage of racism, misogyny, and bigotry that has poured out of the mouth of the Republican party nominee and his bedfellows has unleashed the underbelly of this country and its darkest side.  The election result has spawned a crippling shadow over my whole universe and I know this has been true for over half of this country.  We are embarrassed to call ourselves American, as it associates us with this new, evil and mean rhetoric in the eyes and ears of the rest of the world.  This is not the country I have known to be the home of the free.

And so it was, amidst my deepest disappointment that has sent me into a physical nausea that I cannot shake, that I read how Kennedy, seeking to defend Ruth in her ultimate trial, really tries to understand the day to day psychological beating that Ruth endures as a Black woman in a white man’s world.   The small slips, the subtle differences in perception, and the more overt signs of difference from which Kennedy is protected because of the color of her skin.  And while the 2 butt heads, they also come together because of the genuine efforts to try to understand each other, which is the foundation of the beginning of actually understanding each other.

Unfortunately for this story, love trumps hate in sort of a too perfect way by the end, so that it becomes a little fairytale-like as an ending.  I pray for this country, though, that we can reach an understanding that even remotely approximates this ending – for the good of our present and the good of our future.

Eating Animals by Jonathan Safran Foer

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I can only start by saying that this book rocked my world.

After 3-4 years of extensive research, travel and investigation, Jonathan Safran Foer collected his findings and analysis into this very readable, very engaging litany of the horrors of the factory farm, through which over 95% of US meat is processed.  These “farms” are really not farms at all, but rather enormous, hugely overcrowded storage facilities for live animals (chickens, turkeys, hogs, and slightly less often, cows).  The animals are fed antibiotic-laced, genetically modified corn, given no fresh air, and crowded into either tiny cages or if they are “cage-free” they are still rarely given more than a few square inches in which to live.  The  drainage of sewage is poor and most live in their own feces.  The animals are sickly and prone to many diseases, including osteoporosis, which makes them susceptible to frequent broken bones.  The killing is generally horrific and not at all the painless, quick way we’d like to think.

In addition to causing animal suffering, the factory farms wreak havoc on the environment.  The sewage alone is enough to pollute the air with toxic gases and nearby water supplies because of run-off.  People living near these facilities have higher incidences of respiratory illness, nausea and other symptoms because of the toxins.

I did not read this because I was a vegetarian.  I did not read this because I am an activist and want to convince everyone to think as I now am thinking.  In fact, this is not even why the author wrote this book.  I have eaten meat all my life – especially poultry.  The author wavered in the past between eating animals and not, acknowledging that there is a shared experience of eating food with other people that perhaps can be impacted if one restricts in some way.  In addition, Foer describes a few farmers who actually have managed to salvage some of the more humane practices on smaller farms to improve the quality of life for the animals and to keep them healthier.  In this way, he presents a more balanced picture, even as these  examples comprise a tiny portion of the animals available for food.  Moreover, Foer does not try to make up anyone else’s mind about what to eat.  He merely presents the facts, gruesome as they are, about the source of our animal foods – and we are free to decide what to do with those facts.

I said it rocked my world and it really did.  I think, after reading this, that I cannot eat poultry.  I’d already cut out red meat awhile ago, so that isn’t a problem, but not eating chicken is going to be quite the challenge.  But I just don’t think I can go back, knowing what I know now, to supporting these practices.

Am I sorry I read this book?  Isn’t ignorance bliss?  I think I’m just sorry it exists at all.  I am not at all sorry that I read this book, though, and I encourage everyone to read it.  It still exists even if we don’t know about it.  Better, then, to know.  And better yet, to act.

Harry Potter and the Cursed Child

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Well, JK Rowling seems to have done it again.  We meet Harry once again, now as an adult with 3 children.  His middle son, Albus, seems to have inherited Harry’s knack for being awkward but charming, and his only friend is, shockingly,  Scorpius, the son of – you guessed it! – Draco Malfoy.  This unlikely pair get themselves into a mess of misunderstandings and potential unleashing of evil in the world, and Albus, just as his father did before him, shows his own form of bravery and a love that conquers all.

It is important to remember that this is a script of a play and not the rich, descriptive prose of a novel.  More is left to the imagination, and the story is left more to dialogue and direction.  That said, the plot is still full of twists and turns and catches the reader off guard as always.  There are still allusions to prior books and it builds on a knowledge of the world of Hogwarts and its history.  And it still remains as a testament to love overcoming evil, as all the Harry Potter books seek to do.

Having experienced the book release parties at midnight this past weekend and reveled in the enthralling enthusiasm among people of all ages over this book – A BOOK!! – I am still just overwhelmed by the gift of this author.  She has succeeded in revitalizing, almost single-handedly, a love of reading across generations.  She has given the world a gift unlike any other in history – and we must be thankful for this.

If you have not read the Harry Potter books, do it now.  It doesn’t matter how old you are.   Anyone can relate to them as they are fantastical but completely relatable.  They are brilliant and imaginative and just plain fun!

Thank you, Ms. Rowling – thank you!

A Well-Tempered Heart by Jan-Phillip Sendker

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Yet another must-read by Jan-Phillip Sendker!  This sequel to the Art of Hearing Heartbeats is just as beautiful as the first – an accomplishment in its own right…

Julia, whose life has been in a lonely downward spiral, has begun to hear a voice.  It is the voice of a woman who is asking who she really is.  Julia, a savvy lawyer in NYC, is terrified that she’s losing her mind.  In her quest for peace from this voice, she encounters a monk who encourages her to return to the home of her deceased father and of her half-brother in Burma, where she might find the source of this voice.  As she begins to discover the story of the voice, she also learns a great deal about herself and what is really important to her.

The writing in this book achieves a level somewhere between poetry and philosophy.  There is more silence than sharp dialogue and it works so well in the context of the story.  What is said is often deeply wise  — so much so, that it needs to be read more than once to be fully appreciated.  And the story itself, while tragic and full of horror, is also incredibly beautiful and inspiring.

Most interesting to me, though, was the sharp contrast between the fast-paced luxury of NYC and the peaceful poverty of Burma.  Julia’s brother, U Ba, has a love of life and an appreciation for what little he has.  Here in NYC, we have so much and generally want more still.  There is a lot to be learned from the simple love, acceptance, and appreciation espoused by the wise characters in this book.

Must read!

 

The 100 Year Old Man Who Jumped Out the Window and Disappeared by Jonas Jonasson

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This delightful story is a sort of Swedish Forrest Gump for world history.  Allan Karlsson, on the morning of his 100th birthday, decides that he needs to take back control of his life and leave the Old Folks Home – via the window.  Little does he know that he’d be starting out on a madcap adventure.  But then again, madcap adventures are not exactly new to Allan, as we learn in the flashbacks that tell of his amusingly political, apolitical life.

I loved this book!  The writing is so understated and subtle that it makes the crazy events in the story that much more outrageous and entertaining.  I could not help laughing out loud at some of the dialogue – it is brilliant.  And the way in which the tale winds around historical events is playful and so imaginative.

I haven’t recommended a “must-read” in a long time – but here’s a most definite!  You are bound to love this one.

A Man Called Ove by Fredrik Backman

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Ove has lost the one person in his life who understood him (his wife) as well as the purpose for him to get up each morning (his job) and he’s now trying to take matters into his own hands.  All he wants is to be reunited with his only love, his wife, Sonja.  Unfortunately, each attempt he makes on his own life gets interrupted by his prying, needy neighbors.  Even the cat seems to need him.  Is everybody helpless?  In spite of his grumpy-old-man exterior, Ove endears himself to everyone around him who recognize that he is in fact the kindest of hearts and the truest of souls.

Because of the tone of the story, which is written through the prism of Ove’s cynical and rigid perspective, I found it, at first, hard to get engaged in this story.  But gradually, there grew moments of subtle tenderness that were so utterly sweet that I was reeled in.  By the end, I was just mush.  Teary mush, actually.

The writing in this story is really very beautiful.  I so admire a writer who can create such colorful and deeply genuine characters as these and who can create such subtly charming moments between them.  Even when Ove is ranting at another – and he does so at almost every  other character – you feel the affection that is exuding between them.  You cannot help either smiling or tearing up through much of the story.

I highly recommend this book.  Just stick with it – it’s worth it!