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My City, My Los Angeles by Jeryl Brunner

March 20, 2013 by

My City, My Los Angeles by Jeryl Brunner, author of My City, My New York (my review), is another book, published in April 2013, that offers some stunning sights and out-of-the way places for tourists to visit.  In Los Angeles, Brunner finds that the actors, actresses, and other celebrities that live there have a lot of advice and stories to share.  Shaun White and Luanne Rice are just some celebs offering their advice in the section on Beaches, Gardens, Hideaways, and Secret Spots, while Lisa Ling and Josh Groban are among those offering advice on the best places to eat.  There’s also advice from nocturnal places to stores, markets, and spas, and sexy spaces to saunters, sails, rides, hikes, and drives.  What’s interesting is that more than one celebrity has said that it takes about 20 years to get used to living in Los Angeles, including Ruth Vitale.

For a newbie to Los Angeles, Brunner’s guide will likely make them feel like an insider, while still ensuring that they hit all the top touristy spots.  In addition to information about each location discussed by the celebrities, readers are given an inside look into the impressions and reasons why celebrities enjoy a particular space and what that space provides them.  Molly Shannon says about the Annenberg Community Beach House, built by William Randolph Hearst for his mistress, “I love the idea that I’m swimming in the mistress’s pool.” (page 4)  Readers will enjoy the back stories as actors and others talk about how they came to Los Angeles, and how they take stay-cations with their spouses to enjoy the sights around them that they normally don’t get to see because they are too busy.

“Pink’s has the best hot dogs.  I like the spicy polish because I’m spicy Polish,” says Richard Dreyfuss.  (page 37)

From producers to city councilmen, Brunner has interviewed a wide range of Los Angeles residents to ensure readers get the most varied information possible.  What’s clear from all of these accounts is that LA is right in the middle of everything from beaches to mountains and hiking as well as museums, gardens, some of the best food, and more.  In the more category is the one story of how Celebrity Autobiography began with Eugene Pack and Dayle Reyfel just reading out loud at a fun space from memoirs of celebrities for fun, and then it grew organically from there.  This story and others seem to be a testament to how artists can create fun and a rewarding project without realizing it — all in a space devoted to nocturnal fun, mingling, and most likely drinking.

One of my favorite openings to a section is in Stores, Markets, & Spas, where Brunner quotes Patti Smith’s plea that we not abandon the paper book and Natalie Compagno’s connection to books from a young age and her determination to buy a closing bookstore devoted to books on travel.  Readers will want to sink into Mandy Patinkin’s Beverly Hot Springs and visit any of the farmer’s markets in the LA area, as well as the unforgettable The Cheese Store of Silver Lake.

My City, My Los Angeles by Jeryl Brunner will make readers’ mouths water for the food in the city and for the relaxation to be had on the beaches and in the mountains.  But more than that, she provides an insider’s look at an American icon.  It makes me want to visit LA, how about you?

***Now I’d love to see one about Washington, D.C.***

About the Author:

For author and journalist, Jeryl Brunner, a good interview is like a tango – complex, soulful, fiery, exciting and illuminating. And she’s been dancing for years, contributing to a variety of publications including O, the Oprah Magazine, National Geographic Traveler, Travel + Leisure, Delta Sky, Elle.com, ForbesTraveler.com, Four Seasons, People, Us Weekly, Brides, Parade, AOL and Huffington Post.

Filed Under: nonfiction, Read in 2013, Reference, review copy, reviews Tagged With: ,

The Best of PUNK Magazine by John Holmstrom and Bridget Hurd

March 7, 2013 by

The Best of PUNK Magazine by John Holmstrom and Bridget Hurd, with a foreward from Deborah Harry (yes, the singer from Blondie) and Chris Stein (co-founder of Blondie), is a compilation of the best articles and artwork from the magazine, and it opens with a fun depiction of New York City — “The PUNK Map of N.Y.C.: For jerks who just don’t know their way around.”  The drawings of the rivers and the streets and the realistic, and yet, out there cartoons are likely to generate smirks, if not genuine smiles.

As someone born in the late 1970s, but in love with punk music and Blondie, this collection is something that provides not only more background about the emergence of punk, but also the  whimsical fun and sort of not-a-care-in-the-world feel of the genre.  PUNK magazine had a lot to live up to as the voice of 1970s New York, but it also had a lot to break away from in terms of what was expected of a music magazine.  Clearly, PUNK was a magazine dedicated to snarkiness in all its forms — visual and textual — and it worked well.  It was gritty, it was real, and the glamor was no where in its photos or its comics, but that seems to be why the magazine stood out.  There was a whole lot of youthful exuberance in the beginning of this magazine as nicknames were handed out and spaces were renamed — like the PUNK Dump.

The opening interview with Lou Reed is just the tip of the mosh pit with this magazine.  Reed is so candid, it’s almost like he forgot he was being interviewed by a magazine, and it is unlikely anyone told him the interview would be turned into a comic strip.  The comics are filled with typical masculine and bathroom humor at times, but the drawings are enough to carry the jokes beyond their static line.  A really cool moment in the collection is the results of the Patti Smith Graffiti Contest, where some are so tasteful and others are just outrageous.

By the third issue, the magazine’s editors knew they were a hit when the Ramones snagged a record contract in part because of the magazine’s coverage of their band.  One particular gem in the collection is Holmstrom’s explanation of punk:  “sound — faster and louder; humor — like the novelty songs of the 1950s and 1960s; fashion — no glam, just the classics: shades, blue jeans, t-shirt, sneakers; minimalism — less is more.  No bombast; attitude — similar to the hippie ethos “Do your own thing but let me do mine,” but more like: “F**k you! I don’t care what you do, just leave me alone!”; do it yourself — publish your own ‘zine, make your own record; retro rock/conservatism — mining the tradition of rock ‘n’ roll from the 1950s and early 1960s, while rejecting everything after the hippies took over in 1967.”

The Best of PUNK Magazine by John Holmstrom and Bridget Hurd is a great compilation, but you may not want to leave it on the coffee table with conservative parents or in-laws around.  It’s got some bawdy humor, creative ideas, fantastically candid photos and interviews with punk rock stars of the time, and so much more.  Reminiscent of MAD Magazine and the like, but it really has a garage feel about it — a passion of the listener, the true fans of PUNK.

About the Author:

John Holmstrom is a cartoonist and writer and co-founder (with Legs McNeil) of Punk magazine. He illustrated the covers of the Ramones albums Rocket to Russia and Road to Ruin, and created the characters Bosko and Joe, which were published in Scholastic’s Bananas magazine from 1975-1984, as well as in Stop! Magazine, Comical Funnies, Twist, and High Times. Holmstrom’s work and unmistakable artistic style has become the key visual representation of the Punk era.

This is my 13th book for the 2013 New Authors Challenge.

Filed Under: challenges, essays, Harper Collins, New Authors Challenge, nonfiction, Publishers/Publicists, Read in 2013, review copy, reviews Tagged With: , ,

Six Sisters’ Stuff: Family Recipes, Fun Crafts, and Much More & 4×4 Dinner Giveaway/Challenge

March 5, 2013 by

Six Sisters’ Stuff:  Family Recipes, Fun Crafts, and So Much More! is a flexible paperback cookbook that not only includes gorgeous photos of entrees, appetizers, and desserts, but also a variety of crafts to keep your kids occupied and to dress up the table.  Camille, Kristen, Elyse, Stephanie, Lauren, and Kendra are biological sisters and know what it means to have a busy life, but they still make time for family dinners and this book includes 100 easy-to-follow recipes using ingredients commonly found in your pantry.

The full-color photos in this cookbook will make your mouth water even if you’ve just eaten dinner.  From the main meals to the slow cooker meals, these women have made cooking for a family incredibly easy and simple with these recipes.  There are salads, sides, and breads, plus dessert — oh, the dessert.  (I made one for book club, see photos and reaction below)  But this book is not only about the food and having family meals together, but it also is about spending time with family whether it’s on a road trip or inside on a rainy day (I’ll be testing these out in the coming weeks).

There are projects ranging from creating simple decorations like a snowman out of blocks and felt bows to more complex projects like bookshelves made out of pallets.  These projects are sure to occupy family members and make the house look more beautiful.  The sisters also offer advice on spring cleaning, which may seem like common sense but for a first time homeowner with a new kid the task can be overwhelming.  There also are healthy snack ideas, fun date ideas to keep the romance alive, and a weekly breakdown on how to build a 72-hour emergency kit for the entire family.

Six Sisters’ Stuff:  Family Recipes, Fun Crafts, and So Much More! is appealing to look at, create from, and learn.  It’s not only about cooking a healthy meal in a short amount of time with the ingredients on hand, but it’s also focused on ensuring that family time becomes a priority.  Readers will have no choice but to dig in and start creating.  Delicious family recipes ready to fill watering mouths and simple crafts to spruce up any busy home.

My baking experience with Mom’s Chocolate Marshmallow Brownies:

As is usual with me, I was pulled in a hundred different directions and had to improvise the recipe, though I do plan to make this recipe the way it is written at some point.  I wanted to make these for book club in February, but with little time, I turned to my favorite box brownie mix, Ghirardelli Dark Chocolate Brownie mix, which never fails me.  And I quickly found the brownie pan I chose would require me to use 2 boxes, which met the hubby had to run out and get a second box.

But then I made the Chocolate frosting from the recipe for on top of the marshmallows.  The recipe called for 2-3 cups of powdered sugar, but I found out quickly that 2 cups was too little because the frosting was soupy, so I had to make it 3 cups for the right consistency.  Once I got the frosting made, i spread it on top of the marshmallows (which I really didn’t need the whole bag of).

The pan must have still been a bit warm because the frosting melted a little too much over the marshmallows, making it an even gooier mess than I expected, but it didn’t seem to matter to the book club members who were eager to try it.  I just had to have the first piece, and one of the corners, since those are my favorite!  I took a close up of one piece to share with everyone.  YUM!

Six Sisters photoAbout the Six Sisters:

In February 2011, we started our blog SixSistersStuff.com. After years of living close to one another, we were being pulled in many different directions- one sister moved to the West coast, another sister followed her husband to medical school, one moved away to college, and another sister had just lost a baby. We needed each other now more than ever and we used our blog as a way to stay in touch.

Before we started blogging, we were constantly calling each other for recipe ideas, craft projects, and ways to keep our children entertained during those long winter days. The blog was the perfect way for us to share those ideas with each other and we were having so much fun doing it. We are all busy, whether it’s with our kids, jobs, school, husbands, community involvement, or something else eating up our time, so all the recipes and projects you will find on this blog are quick and easy! Our recipes are family favorites that use ingredients that can commonly be found in your pantry and our crafts and home decor projects can be made with little or no money. We don’t claim to be amazing chefs- we just know the importance of feeding your family a home-cooked meal and sitting down to eat it together.

 

This is my 12th book for the 2013 New Authors Challenge.

 

 

About the 4×4 Dinner Challenge:

4X4 dinner challenge

  • Pledging to accept the 4×4 Dinner Challenge means the family will eat together at least four times per week for four weeks.
  • Families are encouraged to register online, and they will receive meal tips, ideas for family activities, and helpful recipes to make meeting the challenge easy.

To win a copy of this colorful cook book, do the following:

  1. Like the Six Sister’s STUFF Facebook page and join the 4×4 Dinner Challenge
  2. Click the 4×4 Family dinner banner on the Website (on the right sidebar) and leave a comment joining the challenge.
  3. Come back here and leave a comment on this post about what you’d like to check out in Six Sisters’ Stuff.

Deadline to enter is March 10, 2013, at 11:59 PM EST.

Filed Under: challenges, giveaway, New Authors Challenge, nonfiction, Read in 2013, Reference, review copy, reviews Tagged With: ,

The Heart of Haiku by Jane Hirshfield

March 1, 2013 by

The Heart of Haiku by Jane Hirshfield, which I first read about it on Beth Kephart’s blog, is lyrical, meandering, and informative not only about Haiku — the art, its origination, and its longevity — but also about one of the greatest poets, Bashō, who lived and breathed Haiku.  Knowing very little about this Japanese poet from the 17th century doesn’t mean you don’t know him because as Hirshfield points out, he infuses every Haiku with his soul and experiences.  Not only can readers live his moments alongside him, but they also can create their own experiences within the Haiku.

“To read a haiku is to become its co-author, to place yourself inside its words until they reveal one of the proteus-shapes of your own life.  The resulting experience may well differ widely between readers:  haiku’s image-based language invites an almost limitless freedom of interpretation.”

Like many poets, verse comes naturally and is less like a job or profession than it is like breathing.  With elements of Zen and Shinto’s spiritual traditions, the poet led a contemplative life focused on not only the natural world, but his experiences with it and as part of it.  At many points in his life, he is affected by events beyond his control, but his poetry never fails to account for these moments or to push him through those hardships — even though it doesn’t seem as though Bashō considered them hardships.  Hirshfield says, “He wanted to renovate human vision by putting what he saw into a bare handful of mostly ordinary words, and he wanted to renovate language by what he asked it to see.”

“Zen is less the study of doctrine than a set of tools for discovering what can be known when the world is looked at with open eyes.  Poetry can be thought of in much the same way, and the recognition of impermanence, ceaseless alteration, and interdependence–the connection of each person, creature, event, and object with every other–need not be “Buddhist.”  These elements permeate the poetry of every tradition. . .”

What is most beautiful about Hirshfield’s examination of Bashō is the reverence she pays to him and her passion for not only his work, but also his dedication to improving it even when near death.  And like many others, he remained focused on pushing his students to strive for more than even he could achieve, urging them not to be the “other half of the split melon” by mirroring his own work.  Hirshfield not only provides history and poetry in this essay, but she also pinpoints the evolution of Haiku and discusses its beauty and its endurance through the ages, even as a teaching tool.

The Heart of Haiku by Jane Hirshfield is a stunning examination of one Japanese poet’s work and his love of life and poetry.  Her narration provides a unique way of stepping into the life and thoughts of Bashō as writer, poet, teacher, and human being.

About the Author:

Jane Hirshfield was born in New York City in 1953. After receiving her B.A. from Princeton University in their first graduating class to include women, she went on to study at the San Francisco Zen Center. Her books of poetry include Come, Thief (Alfred A. Knopf, 2011), After (HarperCollins, 2006); Given Sugar, Given Salt (2001), which was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award, The Lives of the Heart (1997), The October Palace (1994), Of Gravity & Angels (1988), and Alaya (1982).

This is my 11th book for the 2013 New Authors Challenge.

Filed Under: challenges, New Authors Challenge, nonfiction, poetry, purchased, Read in 2013, reviews Tagged With: ,

King Solomon’s Ring by Konrad Z. Lorenz

November 15, 2012 by

King Solomon’s Ring by Konrad Lorenz, an Austrian ethologist, is not your typical science book in that it is written with a less-scientific audience in mind.  Complete with minimal illustrations from Lorenz, the book does not read like a scientific experiment that can be precisely duplicated, but more like a series of observations and anecdotes from a man who invited the wild into his home.  Unlike King Solomon, Lorenz claims not to need a magic ring to learn the language of animals and to communicate with them.  While there are discussions of domesticated and wild dogs, among other animals, Lorenz mainly focuses on the behaviors of the water shrew, his aquarium fish, and the Jackdaw.

While considered a premier examination of animal behavior and discussing in detail the phenomenon of imprinting, on some occasions he appears to anthropomorphize these animals, making them seem more human than they are, particularly when discussing their mating rituals.  Lorenz also is very descriptive of the animals and their interactions with one another and with the humans who lived in the home and surrounding neighborhood.  These descriptions, while interesting to a scientist, may border on tedium for others.

“The whole charm of childhood still lingers, for me, in such a fishing net.”  (page 12)

“I intend to develop further this mixed breed, now that it has happily survived the war, and to continue with my plan to evolve a dog of ideal character.”  (page 142)

He raises some interesting questions about the parallels between certain species and humans in that some species, like humans, share their experiential knowledge of dangers and enemies with their young, rather than their young having an instinctual knowledge of what animals are their natural enemies.  Lorenz also discuss language and how body language is a lost art among humans, but is alive and well among animals, like yawning and smiling in humans to signify an emotion.

His wife must have had enormous levels of patience, though the bit about leaving their own child in a cage while the animals roamed free in the house and outside was hopefully a joke.  King Solomon’s Ring by Konrad Lorenz is light on scientific method and heavy on observation, but at times the descriptions get bogged down with too much detail even for a general audience.  For those who have studied imprinting and other aspects of animal behavior before, the book could seem very repetitive and far from engaging.  Additionally, there are moments where he pats himself on the back or the backs of his friends who achieve some interesting feats with animals, which can seem a bit self-serving.

About the Author:

Konrad Z. Lorenz ForMemRS was an Austrian zoologist, ethologist, and ornithologist. He shared the 1973 Nobel Prize with Nikolaas Tinbergen and Karl von Frisch.

 

This is my 81st book for the New Authors Reading Challenge in 2012.

 

What Book Club Thought:

This book, which was our November pick, really wowed one member of the book club, who said he learned a great deal from Lorenz and his theories about animals in his care, while most of us seemed to think that we’d learned all of the things he talked about in the book already through other sources — most likely in school or the animal channel.  The rest of us either thought it was an OK book or didn’t like it very much at all.  Our youngest member said that there should have been more about Penguins, though Lorenz lived in a place where Jackdaws were the most prevalent bird it seemed.  Two members found the chapter about dog ancestry and behavior the most interesting, particularly about the relationship to masters and one another in a pack versus the dog that prefers to be alone.

One heated discussion was about whether animals are intelligent or not, with one member playing devil’s advocate and insisting that animals act on pure instinct and are not problem-solving beings with intelligence.  In one scenario, the member suggested the lion would simply die in the arctic and be unable to problem-solve their way out of the situation or find food, but it was argued that there are different levels of intelligence in the animal kingdom and that some things can be learned by animals and other things cannot.  Additionally, there was a discussion about adaptability versus intelligence as well as the teaching of danger to young animals by their parents, much like humans teach their own children about dangers.

Filed Under: challenges, New Authors Challenge, nonfiction, purchased, Read in 2012, reviews Tagged With: , , ,

Thoughts on Some Remarks by Neal Stephenson

August 30, 2012 by

Some Remarks by Neal Stephenson is a collection of essays, one sentence from a novel that he never finished, and a few short stories.  I’m not the typical audience for this book as I don’t read a lot of non-fiction, nor science-y essays.  As a result, I read a bit of the most recent essays in the collection, the introduction, and the short fiction pieces, plus the one sentence to the novel.  I can say that I see why he never went further with his novel; it wasn’t very attention grabbing for me, but hey, it might have been a sentence from a future chapter and not the book opener for all I know.

To say this collection is weird is an understatement; readers only need to check out “Spew” with its tech-babble and sci-fi tongue-in-cheek feel as Profile Auditor 1 skulks around the big brother system that watches everyone’s lives for a living, looking for anomalies.  I found the overwrought tech language and mysteriousness too much; I was kept too much in the dark for the beginning part of the short story.  However, by the end, I was intrigued by the hotel clerk and her suspicious profile and wondered what the profiler’s interest in her was, but it is clear by the end of the story that she’s got more gumption than he does.  While Stephenson brings up issues of big brother and what it could mean from a marketing perspective, the story also gave me pause about my own buying habits and whether I’m that gullible in my purchases — seeing it on television or the Internet is enough to make me buy it — but I also realized that is not all that he is highlighting, but also the factors that play into buying decisions from friends, recommendations, advertisements, and finances.

“Patch this baby into your HDTV, and you can cruise the Metaverse, wander the Web and choose from among several user-friendly operating systems, each one rife with automatic help systems, customer-service hot lines and intelligent agents.  The theater’s subwoofer causes our silverware to buzz around like sheet-metal hockey players, and amplified explosions knock swirling nebulas of tiny bubbles loose from the insides of our champagne glasses.”  (page 288, “The Great Simoleon Caper”)

The second short story, “The Great Simoleon Caper,” relies on a similar notion of a man behind the technology who looks in on customers through their set top boxes, but instead of profiling their likes and dislikes and buying habits, he is their customer service representative to iron out their problems.  In this scenario — which began with a “innocent” brother’s request for how many jelly beans would fill up Soldier Field — the customer service rep brother is suddenly thrust into an underground plan to circumvent government controls.  Investing in Simoleons, an e-money, is a campaign his brother wants to succeed, but how will his brother ensure that the deal goes off without a hitch.  Do you sense a bit of paranoia in these stories?  A bit too much over-the-shoulder watching?  Perhaps that’s a good thing — keeping people honest and on their toes.

Stephenson’s fiction was livelier and more inventive to me than the nonfiction essays about the dangers of sitting at a desk for your job and other topics, which seemed to try to hard to be humorous or witty.  Some Remarks is an interesting collection of essays, but for someone that reads mostly fiction and poetry, this is not a good fit.

About the Author:

Neal Stephenson is the author of the three-volume historical epic “The Baroque Cycle” (Quicksilver, The Confusion, and The System of the World) and the novels Cryptonomicon, The Diamond Age, Snow Crash, and Zodiac. He lives in Seattle, Washington.

This is my 64th book for the New Authors Reading Challenge 2012.

Filed Under: challenges, Harper Collins, New Authors Challenge, nonfiction, Publishers/Publicists, Read in 2012, Reference, reviews Tagged With: , ,

The Book Club Cook Book (revised edition) by Judy Gelman and Vicki Levy Krupp

July 26, 2012 by

The Book Club Cook Book (revised edition) by Judy Gelman and Vicki Levy Krupp is a second edition that includes more book recommendations from book clubs across America and recipes from the authors of those books.  The book is the brain child of two voracious readers who love to share their reading and the recipes they pair with their own book club selections.  After surveying more than 500 book clubs, including some contacted for the previous version, Gelman and Krupp filled out the cook book with some of the latest books being discussed, while retaining the ones that remain book club picks.

Additionally, they sought to include some vivid, color photos to demonstrate the breadth of new recipes included in the latest version of the cookbook.  If there were one nitpick with this cookbook, it would be that each recipe or most should include a photograph of the food created from the authors’ recipes — either from book clubs or the authors providing the recipes.

What’s unique about this cookbook is that each book is described in detail, complete with publisher and publication information, and information from one or more book clubs about the recipe used to accompany the book club discussion of the book.  Following the recipe, “Novel Thoughts” offers up a bit more from book clubs about what they felt and discussed about the book and how it inspired them to cook or read another book they found to be related, and more.  In “More Food for Thought,” book clubs offer full menus for certain books or how books generate culinary creativity.

In the back of the book, there are ideas about what makes book clubs successful and how books can be selected, etc.  Moreover, the authors include ideas on where to look for food inspiration in books that don’t explicitly mention meals, such as paying attention to the time period, the setting, or culture.  The Book Club Cook Book (revised edition) by Judy Gelman and Vicki Levy Krupp is an excellent cookbook for book clubs and those just looking for new recipes to try out, and paired with the Website even novice cooks can wow their families.

***I had the joy of meeting both these passionate readers and cooks at the Gaithersburg Book Festival in May, and I’m eager to check out their other books.

About the Authors:

Judy Gelman and Vicki Levy Krupp, are cooks, book enthusiasts and friends. Seeking to combine their passion for books, food, and book clubs, they met over stacks of books and endless cups of coffee at a local sandwich shop, where The Book Club Cookbook was born. The revised edition of The Book Club Cookbookwill be published in March, 2012.

They were motivated to write their second book, The Kids’ Book Club Book, after librarians, parents, and teachers who attended their talks asked for a similar book for the growing number of youth book clubs across the country.

Table of Contents features book related recipes from fifty of today’s most popular authors.

Their latest book is the revised edition of The Book Club Cookbook, featuring 20 new book club titles and recipes.

Judy and Vicki enjoy speaking about book clubs, and appreciate their ongoing conversations, both in person and via their websites, with book and food enthusiasts across the country.

They live with their families in the Boston area.

This is my 55th book for the New Authors Reading Challenge 2012.

Filed Under: challenges, New Authors Challenge, nonfiction, Penguin, Publishers/Publicists, purchased, Read in 2012, reviews Tagged With: , , ,

The Paper Garden by Molly Peacock

June 1, 2012 by

Poet Molly Peacock’s The Paper Garden is not only a collage and biography of a woman, Mary Delany, who began a career as an artist late in life, but it also is partially a memoir of Peacock’s own life and the nuggets of wisdom she’s gained from her obsession with this floral artist and her collages or flower mosaicks.  Delany is a woman who began working with scissors and paper long before she gained recognition for her art, starting as a young girl in school.  While one of her classmates recognized her talent, life got in the way as Delany was plucked from her home and moved to her aunts and back again as English politics became tumultuous and her family backed the Pretender.

“A few of the papers she used — all of the papers in the eighteenth century were handmade — in fact were wallpapers, but mostly she painted large sheets of rag paper with watercolor, let them dry, then cut from them the hundreds of pieces she needed to reproduce — well, to re-evoke might be a better word — the flower she was portraying.  There is no reproduced hue that matches the thrill of color in nature, yet Mrs. D. went after the original kick of natural color, and she did it like a painter.”  (page 7-8 ARC)

Through all of the upheaval, Delany kept to her crafts and her music, once inspired by a meeting with Handel.  Peacock’s prose is intimate and conversational as she speaks of Delany like a beloved friend and peer.  She speaks of her journey to learn about Delany’s life and craft like a careful historian citing her sources and engaging in reverence for her subject.  Through her delicate prose, the beauty of Delany and her work emerge gradually, like the petals of a bud opening slowly as the sun rises.

Peacock does a fantastic job comparing individual mosaicks to events in Delany’s life in England and Ireland even though many of the pieces were created long after the death of her second husband and her younger sister, Anne.  She was an early mixed media artist who used wallpapers, paints, dried leaves, and other materials to create her portraits of flowers, breathing new life into even the most simple flower.

The Paper Garden by Molly Peacock is a quiet read chock full of details about Mary Delany’s craft, her family, and her inspiration, but it also is full of advice, beautiful images of Delany’s work, and tidbits about Peacock’s motivations in her own poetry and life.  Readers will dip into this book, think and wonder about Delany’s craft, but also ruminate on what this journey she embarked upon taught her and ourselves.  In almost a meditative way, the biography pulls the reader in and pushes them out to ensure the depth of the art and its meaning is thought about on a deeper level.

***Some of my favorite quotes from the book that can apply to writing***

“Great technique means that you have to abandon perfectionism.  Perfectionism either stops you cold or slows you down too much.  Yet, paradoxically, it’s proficiency that allows a person to make any art at all; you must have technical skill to accomplish anything, but you also must have passion, which, in an odd way, is technique forgotten.”  (page 28 ARC)

“Not to know is also sometimes the position of the poet, who depends on close observation to magnify a subject, hoping to discover an animating spirit.  There’s romance in that forensic impulse . . .” (page 34 ARC)

About the Author:

Molly Peacock is the award-winning author of five volumes of poetry, including The Second Blush. Her poems have appeared in the New Yorker, the Paris Review, and the Times Literary Supplement. Among her other works are How to Read a Poem . . .  and Start a Poetry Circle and a memoir, Paradise, Piece by Piece. Peacock is currently the poetry editor of the Literary Review of Canada and the general series editor of The Best Canadian Poetry in English. A transplanted New Yorker, she lives in Toronto.

Visit Molly Peacock’s Website.

Click for Tour Stops

This is my 4th book for the 2012 Ireland Reading Challenge.

Filed Under: ARC, Bloomsbury, Ireland Challenge, nonfiction, Publishers/Publicists, Read in 2012, reviews, tlc book tours Tagged With: ,

Star Wars & Philosophy edited by Kevin S. Decker and Jason T. Eberl

March 20, 2012 by

Star Wars & Philosophy edited by Kevin S. Decker and Jason T. Eberl is a collection of philosophical essays that draw on the Star Wars movies for examples and the philosophies of St. Augustine, Sartre, and others.  The collection is moderately well done in some parts and blatantly falls short in others, with one particular essay not using secondary sources to back up its arguments at all and leaving readers to beg the question whether Trekkies can write about Star Wars at all.  The essays draw on ancient philosophers as far back as Plato and Aristotle as well as one essay about Eastern philosophies and mythologies.  There are also essays that point to the theories of Kant, Heidegger, and Hegel.

Broken up into four sections — May the Force Be With You: The Philosophical Messages of Star Wars; Try Not — Do or Do Not: Ethics in a Galaxy Far, Far Away; Don’t Call Me a Mindless Philosopher: Alien Technologies and the Metaphysics of the Force; and There’s Always a Bigger Fish: Truth, Faith and a Galactic Society — the collection tackles the hidden philosophies and ethics inherent in the story behind Star Wars and its characters, plus the ethics of future wars and whether droids can be considered people (not humans).  There also are questions about whether everything is preordained or if we have the free will to choose our own paths.  Moreover, religion and moral ambiguity are discussed as well, especially in terms of prophecy and whether one can choose to be moral even if a destiny signifies an opposite action.

In terms of Yoda, when watching the movies, there is a clear Eastern philosophical influence in his manner, his behavior and his teachings, but in the essay “Stoicism in the Stars” by William O. Stephens, the author also makes the case that Yoda is a Stoic and takes on the role of the Sage who never rises to anger and never gives into the desires or seeks out adventure or excitement.  Additionally, Stephens comments on how Stoics often live in agreement with Nature as Yoda does in his hut on Dagobah, and Yoda praises equanimity and peace of mind, which also is characteristic of Buddhists and others who meditate to find peace and separate themselves from ego.  In a way, several essays — even though they focus on Western philosophy — often draw out elements of those philosophies that are found in Eastern philosophy, such as the fluidity of the Force in Star Wars or the fluidity of the future despite prophecies and destinies referred to with regard to the Skywalker family, which is somewhat like the soul or the energy shared by all living things in Eastern philosophy that is reused and recycled in nature (i.e. reincarnation, etc.).

What does this collection offer that is new to someone who was a philosophy major or minor, probably very little, but what was intriguing was some of the history lessons, such as the parallels between the Jedi in Star Wars and the Hwa Rang as leaders of the “military.”  It does provide a great number of secondary resources for readers to check out should they need further explanation of a philosophy without the Star Wars references.  None of the references used were overly surprising in the well done essays, but there were times when references to the movies were inappropriate to the argument being made.  Such was the case in the essay “Send in the Clones:  The Ethics of Future Wars” by Richard Hanley (which cited no secondary sources other than a previous essay in the book) in which Hanley talks about Just War Theory — that is only satisfied by having the right intention, competent authority, just cause, reasonable prospect of success, discrimination, and proportionality — but does not use an example of actual war from the movie.  Rather, Hanley relies on the slaughter of the Sand people by Anakin Skywalker, which he engages in to revenge the killing of his mother by specific Sand people.  Clearly, the vengeful act of Anakin is not warfare and should not be used to demonstrate unjust war.

Star Wars & Philosophy edited by Kevin S. Decker and Jason T. Eberl offers little in the way of new theories about the movies, but does provide fodder for book club discussions and additional contemplation about our world and our selves.

***March Book Club Selection***

We all arrived early it seemed to Novel Places for our March meeting, which could have been a sign we were eager to discuss the book.

This selection was made by one of the males in the group and it did generate a great deal of discussion, even though he was likely the only one who finished the entire collection.  Most of the group picked a few essays to read, while some of us attempted to read more than half.  The essay about whether droids could be considered people generated a great deal of discussion as some of us could see the difference the author was trying to draw between being a “person” and likely being “human.”  Others thought that the argument was not well done, though the example in the essay of a blind woman believing C3P0 was a “man” and not a “droid” just from listening to the movie was telling about how well George Lucas had drawn the character to be human-like.

Another essay generating a great deal of discussion was the one regarding the gray areas of war and of course the use of clones in warfare, though the essay had fallen apart as the arguments were not backed by secondary sources and the author failed to sustain the foundation of his arguments.

Overall, the club would probably say it was a tepid read, but it did generate a great deal of discussion about the world around us, war, and morality.  For that reason, I’d recommend it alone.  I generally think this book would have worked better with two contrasting essays on a given point, such as whether clone armies should be used and whether clone armies should not be used and the reasons for each, because it would have provided a more rounded discussion.  I also think that even though there were Star Wars references illustrating the authors’ points, some essays could have benefited from a little more background and use of secondary sources.

For April, we’re reading A Lesson in Secrets by Jacqueline Winspear.

The Giveaway:

1. Leave a comment about why you’d want to read this book in the comments.

2.  Extra entries for those that Tweet, Facebook, or otherwise spread the word about the giveaway and leave me a link.

Deadline is March 31, 2012. Open Internationally.

 

This is my 18th book for the 2012 New Authors Challenge.

Filed Under: challenges, giveaway, New Authors Challenge, nonfiction, purchased, Read in 2012, reviews Tagged With: , , , ,

The War to End All Wars: World War 1 by Russell Freedman

February 10, 2012 by

The War to End All Wars: World War 1 by Russell Freedman is a collection of historical information about the war enhanced by photos and a good introduction to this part of history for ages 7 and up.  Not only does Freedman offer the political, social, and military ins and outs of the build up to WWI, he illustrates the circumstances of the time period through photographs of soldiers in training, women pinning flowers on marching soldiers leaving for war, women plowing the fields without horses, and event the modern weaponry used.

Readers looking for an in-depth examination of the period will want to this book because the photos break up the factual litany and provide a human face behind the story.  Some of the surprising pictures for me were of the modern tanks that the British created and the gas masks made for horses.  Ironically, the rebels who were the catalyst behind the war had no idea that Archduke Franz Ferdinand was sympathetic to the Serbs cause for greater free and a larger voice in the Austria-Hungary empire.  In another section of the book, readers will discover similarities between WWI and the Cold War with the build up of armies and weapons, but unlike during the Cold War, the leaders during WWI were unsuccessful in their attempts at diplomacy even though many of the royal leaders were related.

However, don’t mistake this as a completely dark and dreary book because there are lighter moments depicted where soldiers created a snowman and gave him military gear, including a spiked helmet and Mauser 98 rifle.  However, war is far from pretty with the death of comrades from artillery shells to the rampant diseases that quickly spread through the primitive trenches, including trench foot, trench fever spread by bloodsucking lice, and other ailments.

“Added to these indignities was the awful stench that hung over the frontlines, a foul odor that instantly assaulted visitors.  You could smell the frontline miles before you could see it.  The reek rose from rotting corpses lying in shallow graves, from overflowing latrines, and from the stale sweat of men who had not enjoyed the luxury of a bath for weeks.”  (page 68)

To be honest, the photos accompanying the early sections about the serious living conditions these soldiers faced in the trenches are inadequate, but there is little the author could do about that.  The images of men caught up in barbed wire in No-Man’s Land or crossing the battlefield in a cloud of poison gas are simply haunting in a way that the numbers of dead (4 million Russian soldiers by the end of 1915) are unfathomable.  Modern warfare began during WWI with the manufacture of tanks and German U-boats, which were allegedly responsible for the sinking of the Lusitania in 1915.  But the United States did not declare war until 1917 after Germans attacked a number of U.S. ships.  There are stunning images of how societies coped with food shortages as trade was disrupted and how people reacted as they were forced to pick up the pieces after soldiers left.

The War to End All Wars: World War 1 by Russell Freedman is a comprehensive look at WWI and all the nations involved, as well as how it impacted not only the societies bombed and destroyed, but also the soldiers.  Despite all the destruction, patriotism drove many soldiers and supporters of the war, and it begs the question when does patriotism become a detriment to society and humanity.

This is my 9th book for the 2012 New Authors Challenge.

 

 

 

This is my 4th book for the WWI Reading Challenge.

Filed Under: borrowed copy, challenges, New Authors Challenge, nonfiction, Publishers/Publicists, Read in 2012, reviews, WWI Reading Challenge 2012 Tagged With: , , ,

A Train in Winter by Caroline Moorehead

November 30, 2011 by

A Train in Winter by Caroline Moorehead strives to shed light on the occupation of France by Germany during World War II and the rise of the French Resistance, particularly the role of women within the resistance.  Of the 230 women who were arrested and sent to Auschwitz in Poland, less than 50 survived, and seven were alive when Moorehead began researching and writing this account of their story.  Impeccably well researched, the book takes readers behind the scenes of the French Resistance, and in many ways the level of detail presented can be overwhelming, especially for those not well acquainted with the ins and outs of the time period.  However, this iteration of facts, times, places, and events serves to demonstrate just how confusing a time the German occupation of France was for those who lived it and sought to overcome it.

“In a rising mood of hostility and mockery, they went around repeating their favourite jokes.  ‘Collaborate with the Germans?’ went one.  ‘Think of Voltaire . . . A true Aryan must be blond like Hitler, slender like Goring, tall like Goebbels, young like Petain, and honest like Laval.’  Another started with the question:  ‘Do you know what happened?’ At 9.20, a Jew killed a German soldier, opened his breast and ate his heart!  Impossible!  For three reasons:  Germans have no hearts.  Jews don’t eat pork.  And at 9.20 everyone is listening to the BBC.'” (page 34 ARC)

Clearly, Moorehead’s forte is in biography and she is deft at handling facts and ensuring that they are well explained in accordance with interrelated events and moments in time, but the text is often dry and tough to remain engaged in.  However, even among these facts, there are pockets of emotion where mothers decide to ship their children to foster families or relatives outside Paris so that they can continue working with the Resistance without endangering the lives of their children.  Still others opt to include their children in the fight to restore a free France.  Moorehead fills in some of the history and familial background in for certain women, but in a way, this litany of facts detracts from the ability of the reader to connect more emotionally to these women.

“Half a litre of black coffee in the morning watery soup at midday, 300 grams of bread — if they were lucky — with either a scrape of margarine, a bit of sausage, cheese or jam at night, was not enough to stop the women’s bodies shrinking and feeding on themselves, the fat disappearing first and then the muscles.  The food never varied.”  (page 203 ARC)

It is not until part two that some readers will become truly engaged in the story as the women are tortured and learn to cope with their sparse surroundings at Auschwitz.  The bravery and solidarity of these women is phenomenal.  Unless readers are willing to wade through the political ins and outs of the early French Resistance and occupation of France and the French police’s collaboration with German occupiers, they may not make it to the more engaging and heart wrenching parts of the story.  Moorehead has chosen to tell a true story and to ensure that those who were present have their say in how that story is told, but it may have served better for the story to focus on just a few of the women from the beginning, allowing them to be the face of the others’ struggles.

A Train in Winter by Caroline Moorehead is a tale of survival that needs to be told and remembered.  As one of the women from the resistance said after having survived cancer longer than expected, “Surviving is something that she is very good at.”  (page 6 ARC)

 

To visit the other stops on the TLC Book Tour, click the icon on the left.

 

 

About the Author:

The author of numerous biographies and works of history, including Gellhorn and Human Cargo, Caroline Moorehead has also written for The Telegraph, The Times, and The Independent. The cofounder of a legal advice center for asylum seekers from Africa, she divides her time between England and Italy.

 

This is my 74th book for the 2011 New Authors Reading Challenge.

Filed Under: ARC, challenges, Harper Collins, New Authors Challenge, nonfiction, Publishers/Publicists, Read in 2011, reviews, tlc book tours Tagged With: ,

Around Germantown (MD) Then & Now by Margaret Coleman

September 19, 2011 by

Around Germantown (MD) Then & Now by Margaret Coleman takes a look at what Germantown was like before 1980 and what it was like after the Maryland-Nation Capital Park and Planning Commission adopted the area.  Coming from Massachusetts where many of the towns are older than the actual state and older than the United States, I had no idea that towns/cities were actually planned out ahead of time.  I really thought that they just came about when people started settling into an area and the businesses just cropped up naturally to service those people.  Silly, me.

Germantown, Md., is made up of six villages and the heart of the city has been moved a couple of times as populations and transit projects changed.  My husband and I looked at this book together and I told him we must have been destined to move here, since some of the founding families have the same last name as those of the town we grew up in.  The town also was settled by German farmers in addition to the English farmers already here.

We really enjoyed the photos of places that were and what they came to be, though it saddened us that so many of the original historic structures in the town had burned (on purpose or accidentally) and were not restored and of those that were restored were moved to other locations.  Unfortunately, progress seems to be the mainstay of this town as historic homes have been replaced by gas stations and other signs of commerce.  The tone of the book doesn’t seem as maudlin as I do about it, however.

Around Germantown (MD) Then & Now by Margaret Coleman is an interesting peak into the history of this town, its people, and its growth over the years.  I’d recommend it to locals interested in the area they have moved to or to those who have lived here but know little of its history.  I’ve always enjoyed these types of books even if I don’t live in the areas discussed.  The inclusion of photos of places then and now rounds out the story.

This is my 55th book for the 2011 New Authors Reading Challenge.

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