Little Bee - Chris Cleave

    2008; 271 pages.  New Author? : Yes.  Genre : Middlebrow Lit; Book Club Book; Contemporary Literature.  Laurels : #1 NY Times Best Seller; shortlisted for the 2008 Costa Book Awards, nominated for a 2009 Commonwealth Writers’ Prize, Editors’ Choice - NY Times Book Review, Indie Next pick for February 2009, and a few more.  Overall Rating : 8½*/10.

    It really was an odd occurrence.  A 12-year-old African girl, Little Bee, crosses paths with a career-oriented Englishwoman, Sarah O’Rourke, on a beach outside a Nigerian resort.  It's a moment of deep crisis for both parties, and a time of great loss as well.

    But life moves on, and that was two years ago and far away.  Today, in her house in Kingston-Upon-Thames on the outskirts of London, Sarah is trying to come to grips with a new loss, while struggling to keep the tragic details from traumatizing her 4-year-old son, Charlie.

    So imagine her surprise when Little Bee shows up on her doorstep, asking for help.  What are the odds of their paths crossing this second time, on a different continent, with both of their lives once again undergoing desperate upheavals?

    Well, the odds aren’t quite as long as it would seem.  Somehow, Little Bee has Sarah’s husband’s driver’s license with her, which lists their home address. 

What’s To Like...

    Little Bee (aka “The Other Hand” in the UK) is first and foremost a study in the contrasts between the two main characters.  In a broad view, this includes “rich vs poor”, “white vs black”, “resident vs illegal”, and “African vs European”.  These differences are intensified by the narrator alternating between Sarah and Little Bee with each new chapter, and it is interesting to see how each of them tries, with varying success, to understand the other.

    The underlying theme is the horrors faced by refugees seeking asylum in the UK, in particular those fleeing the “oil wars” that brutalized Nigeria beginning in the 1990’s.  But getting to England is hardly the end of their woe, as Chris Cleave gives insight into their lives in Immigration Removal Centers where, after much suffering, things usually end with deportation to their home countries and certain death.

    The writing style is unique.  The story opens with Bee going to meet Sarah, and with the reader thinking “WTF is going on?”  Chris Cleave then fills in the backstory, seemingly one incident per chapter.  That may sound clunky but it works to perfection here.  There are only a few characters to keep track of, which also seemed unusual.  You’ll love meeting 4-year-old Charlie, who has a Batman complex and tries to reduce every problem to a “baddies vs goodies” situation that can be effortlessly remedied by a superhero.

    The book is written in “English Lite”, meaning there weren’t many instances of spellings like programme/program and gray/grey.  But I had to think twice about what a “glasshouse” and "windscreen wipers” were.  I also enjoyed the “Notes” and “Discussion Guide” sections at the back of the book.  It was enlightening to read about a true incident that inspired Cleave to write Little Bee.

     In subject matter, the book reminded me of Dave Eggers’ What Is The What (reviewed here), and even the schmaltzy movie Driving Miss Daisy.  But the tone here is markedly darker and cussing, adult situations, including rape and torture abound.  Nevertheless, the ending is superb and sobering and for me, a bit of a surprise.

Excerpts...

    “You don’t ask for advice, Sarah.”

    “No?”

    “No.  Not ever.  Not about things that matter, anyway.  You ask whether your tights look right with your shoes.  You ask which bracelet suits your wrist.  You’re not asking for input.  You’re asking your admirers to prove they’re paying attention.”

    “Am I really that bad?”

    “Actually you’re worse.  Because if I do ever tell you gold looks nice with your skin, you make a special point of wearing silver.”  (pg. 118)

    “A dog must be a dog and a wolf must be a wolf, that is the proverb in my country.”

    “That’s beautiful,” said Sarah.

    “Actually, that is not the proverb in my country.”

    “No?”

    “No!  Why would we have a proverb with wolves in it?  We have two hundred proverbs about monkeys, three hundred about cassava.  We talk about what we know.  But I have noticed, in your country, I can say anything so long as I say that is the proverb in my country.  Then people will nod their heads and look very serious.”  (pg. 180)

Kewlest New Word…

Vespertine (adj.) : relating to, occurring, or active in the evening.

Others : Y-Fronts (n.).

“Charlie has extraordinary eyes, doesn’t he?  (…)  They’re like ecosystems in aspic.”.  (pg. 136)

    I don’t really have any quibbles about Little Bee.  Some reviewers think the characters are too contrived.  I find that absurd.  Of course they’re contrived.  That’s why they call it “fiction”.

    I’ve been wanting to read a Chris Cleave book for quite some time, but all the copies of his books/e-books seem to be always checked out at my library.  I assumed that was because they’re a popular “Book Club book”, akin to The Kite Runner or Water For Elephants or even, oog, Marley And Me.  I’m not a big fan of that genre.  They tend to be heavy on the drama, and light on thrills and spills.

    But Little Bee breaks the mold.  Yes, there’s still a lot of emphasis on personal relationships.  But there’s also blood and violence, and a fair amount of human suffering.  Heck, if this is the norm for Book Club fare, I might even consider joining one.

    8½ Stars.  A powerful-yet-short book that'll challenge your preconceptions about illegal immigrants, whether you're living in the USA or the UK.  And if you happen to be in a book club, shake up things by suggesting Little Bee to the group.

Hocus Pocus - Kurt Vonnegut

   1990; 323 pages.  New Author? : Heavens, no.  Genre : Contemporary Fiction; American Literature; Satire.  Overall Rating : 7*/10.

    “My name is Eugene Debs Hartke, and I was born in 1940.  I was named at the behest of my maternal grandfather, Benjamin Wills, who was a Socialist and an Atheist, and nothing but a groundskeeper at Butler University.”

    Thus starts Hocus Pocus, wherein Eugene recounts his life story, with most of the emphasis on the last couple of years, during which he has had some quite severe ups and downs.

    Through a connection with his former CO in Nam, Gene obtained a teaching position at Tarkington College, a private school in Scipio, New York for kids with learning disorders.  Alas, he eventually is fired that position, and takes a similar job at Athena State Prison, just across the lake from Tarkington.

    But a prison revolt leads to bloodshed, and Tarkington College becomes Tarkington Reformatory, upon which Gene is promoted to head warden.  In yet another twist of Fate, he’s now an inmate at the same prison he used to be the warden of.

    And so it goes.

What’s To Like...

    There are no spoilers in the above section; the reader is told all that within the first 4% of the book.  The main plot, and Kurt Vonnegut has never been known to pay undue attention to such a thing, is basically Gene telling you how he arrived at his present state of incarceration. 

    The book is written in the first-person POV (Gene’s), and is mostly stream-of-consciousness with lots of flashbacks.  For unknown reasons, Vonnegut spurned writing out any numbers.  So: “Vietnam was 1 big hallucination” instead of “one big hallucination”.  There are also “code phrases”, such as the titular “hocus pocus” standing for “bullsh*t”.  The Griot™ computer program was way kewl. And it was fun to watch the protagonist as he tries to compare the number of people he killed in Vietnam versus the number of women he’s been to bed with.

    The writing is of course superb, and there’s the anticipated abundance of Vonnegut wit, although for me, it didn’t seem to sparkle as much as usual. Perhaps this was because the themes in Hocus Pocus – the Vietnam war, the social castes in America, the rich vs. the poor class divisions, the broken-down jail system, etc. – are all familiar Vonnegut subjects.

    The book ends with Gene becoming an inmate in his own prison, which is a logical terminus, but I thought it was anti-climactic, since he doesn’t really share any of his experiences from behind bars.  But perhaps that’s covered in another one of his late-in-life books, Jailbird, which is sitting on my Kindle, waiting to be read.  There are some twists at the end, but they aren’t surprising since Vonnegut/Gene tells us of them several times along the story’s way.

    As with all of the author’s books, this is a standalone novel.  Although there are some recurring characters in Vonnegut novels,  he doesn’t do series.  I personally think this is a plus; you don’t miss a thing by not reading them in order.

Kewlest New Word. . .

Absquatulate (v.)  :  to leave abruptly; to flee; to abscond.  (Yankeeism)

Excerpts...

    At least the World will end, an event anticipated with great joy by many.  It will end very soon, but not in the year 2000, which has come and gone.  From that I conclude that God Almighty is not heavily into Numerology.  (loc. 66)

    “Did the letter say why you were named Rob Roy?” I inquired.

    “No,” he said.  “I assumed it must be because she liked the novel by that name by Sir Walter Scott.”

    “That sounds right,” I said.  What good would it do him or anybody else to know that he was named for 2 shots of Scotch, 1 shot of sweet vermouth, cracked ice, and a twist of lemon peel?  (loc. 3680)

Kindle Details...

    Hocus Pocus sells for $6.47 at Amazon.  The rest of Vonnegut’s novels are normally in the $4.99-$9.99 range, but if you keep your eyes peeled, you’ll find that Amazon frequently discounts them, one at a time, to $1.99, which is a fantastic price if you have the patience to wait Amazon out.  I’ve noticed that Amazon quite often discounts books by deceased writers.  I wonder if that’s because the authors are no longer around to protest the pricing policies of their works.

 “Plutonium!  Now there’s the stuff to put hair on a microbe’s chest.”  (loc  2513)

    Kurt Vonnegut was born on 11 November 1922 and died on 11 April 2007.  He wrote 14 novels over the course of his career, plus a dozen shorter pieces of fiction and 9 works of non-fiction.  Hocus Pocus was novel #13, and was published in 1990 when Vonnegut was 68 years old.

    It’s not that this is a bad novel; it’s just that there isn’t anything new for anyone who’s read other books by Vonnegut.  The main themes enumerated earlier will be already familiar to any inveterate Vonnegut fan; they’re just dressed up with different plot details this time out.  Certainly writing about the Vietnam War in 1990 can only be viewed as old hat.

    While reading Hocus Pocus, it occurred to me that Vonnegut might have written this to be kind of his swan song.  For instance, his Elders of Tralfamadore make a cameo appearance, and they have no literary reason to be here.  I even can’t help wondering if the title itself, which we’ve already noted as being code for “Bullsh*t”, isn’t a small, subtle joke by the author to his readers.

    7 Stars.  Hocus Pocus may not be Vonnegut’s best effort, but it doesn’t change my opinion that he is the greatest American author of the latter half of the 20^th century.  Don’t agree with me?  Name a better choice.

The Catcher In The Rye - J.D. Salinger

   1951; 214 pages.  New Author? : Yes.  Genre : American Literature; Realistic Fiction; Banned Books.  Overall Rating : 8½*/10.

    It is not the best of times for Holden Caulfield.  He’s about to be expelled from an exclusive private academy.  Again.  For a total lack of effort.  Again.

    This time it’s prestigious Pencey Prep; it's the 4^th school that Holden will be kicked out of; and he knows his parents are going to hit the roof.  There are still a couple days until the end of the semester, but he decides to leave school early, since his fate is already sealed and he’s surrounded by teachers and students who are (in Holden’s opinion) all phonies.

    He has some cash on him – he comes from an affluent family – and there’s no sense arriving home early to face the inevitable chewing out, so Holden opts to hang out in his hometown for a few days.  Which happens to be New York City.  Take in a play, go ice skating, look up old friends (especially girls), maybe hire a hooker.

    Except all his old friends are phonies.  And he’s still a virgin.

What’s To Like...

    The Catcher In The Rye is J.D. Salinger’s blockbuster 1951 novel, and grasps poignantly the alienation, angst, and crisis-of-identity that many teenagers go through, no matter what generation they belong to.  Some parts of the story can be described as autobiographical fiction, akin to Sylvia Plath and her novel, The Bell Jar (reviewed here).

   The story is told from a first-person POV (Holden’s), and in a stream-of-consciousness format.  Salinger makes extensive use of 1950’s teen-speak, some of which was still around in the 1960’s when I was growing up (eg. : “necking” and “corny”).  It was fun to read about an America that is long-gone, including long-forgotten things like phone booths, a La Salle convertible, and a popular song from that time, “Tin Roof Blues”.  Being the thoughts of an teenager with an attitude, it should not be a surprise that cuss words abound.

    The writing is very good; it has to be to keep the reader’s interest for 200+ pages while recounting Holden’s messed-up view of the world.  But our protagonist has some good aspects too.  He is honest about himself, knows when he’s screwed a situation up, and even evokes some sympathy as he tries to fathom the opposite sex.  One of Holden’s repeated lines is “It’s a funny thing about girls…”

    There are some great scenes in the book – such as the will-he-or-won’t-he encounter with the hooker and her pimp.  And while Holden may have some crumby (to use his vernacular) views on life, some of his mini-discourses are quite engaging, such as his reasons for liking Jesus but hating his disciples.

    The ending is either brilliant or unsatisfying, depending on your expectations.  While it is implied that Holden is finally getting some professional help, it is not clear that it’s altered his outlook on life in any appreciable way.

Kewlest New Word ...

Chiffonier (n.) : a tall chest of drawers, usually with a mirror on top.

Excerpts...

    “Anyway, I keep picturing all those little kids playing some game in this big field of rye and all.  Thousands of little kids, and nobody’s around – nobody big, I mean – except me.  And I’m standing on the edge of some crazy cliff.  What I have to do, I have to catch everybody if they start to go over the cliff – I mean if they’re running and they don’t look where they’re going I have to come out from somewhere and catch them.  That’s all I’d do all day.  I’d just be the catcher in the rye and all.”  (pg. 173)

    “I have a feeling that you’re riding for some kind of a terrible, terrible fall.  But I don’t honestly know what kind … Are you listening to me?”

    “Yes.”

    You could tell he was trying to concentrate and all.

    “It may be the kind where, at the age of thirty, you sit in some bar hating everybody who comes in looking as if he might have played football in college.  Then again, you may pick up just enough education to hate people who say, “It’s a secret between he and I.”  Or you may end up in some business office, throwing paper clips at the nearest stenographer.  I just don’t know.  But do you know what I’m driving at, at all?”

    “Yes.  Sure,” I said.”  (pg. 186)

“If a body catch a body coming through the rye.”  (pg. 115 )

    I have to admit that the first 2/3 of the book got repetitive at times.  Holden hates this, Holden hates that, Holden hates yet another person, and on and on it goes.  Yet it’s all worth it once he sneaks home and talks with his kid sister, Phoebe, who’s the one person in the world who Holden actually cares about.  The feeling is mutual, and that is what gives the reader optimism that Holden might someday get his life together.

    I chose The Catcher In The Rye as my “highbrow literature” book for 2015.  I try to read one of those each year but am not always successful.  It could also have served as my read for “Banned Book Week 2015”, since it continues to be one of the most challenged books year after year.  I find this paradoxical since it is also one of the most recommended-reading books in high school English classes.

    Bottom line: this book thoroughly resonated with me, because so many of Holden’s thoughts and views were also mine back in my salad days.  If you were your high school’s homecoming queen or star quarterback, you may not be able to relate to Holden, and may find his story to be a real drag.  But for every perfectly adjusted kid, there are a hundred others that are confused, maladjusted, and/or socially or emotionally messed up to varying degrees.  And that’s why The Catcher In The Rye remains such a popular novel.

    8½ Stars.  Subtract 1 Star if you prefer Leave It To Beaver to All In The Family.  I don’t know whether to pity you or envy you.

Cold Storage, Alaska - John Straley

    2014; 300 pages.  New Author? : Yes.  Genre : Contemporary Fiction.  Overall Rating : 7½*/10.

    The year is 2000, and Clive McCahon has just finished his 7-year stint for drug-dealing in the McNeil Federal Prison in Washington.  He plans to head back to his hometown, a small, out-in-the-boonies town called Cold Storage, Alaska.  But first he needs to pick up his dog and a little bit of cash.

    Meanwhile, in Cold Storage, his younger brother, Miles McCahon, is resisting the temptation to leave this god-forsaken spot in the wilderness for someplace more civilized.  But he has their aged mother to tend to, as well as being Cold Storage’s only medic, shrink, and purveyor of sage advice.

    You better watch your back, Clive, because a couple people plan on following you to Cold Storage.  One’s a cop who’s convinced Clive’s going to re-start his drug operation there and has vowed to put him in behind bars again.  The other’s a former business associate of Clive's who thinks Clive’s cash is rightfully his.

    Duffel bags full of hundred dollars bills tend to attract more than one claimant.

What’s To Like...

    If you like stories set in Alaska, you’re gonna love this book.  John Straley spends a lot of time “painting” the scenery, and it works here.  You’ll also enjoy meeting a bunch of characters, including most of the local townspeople, although, frankly, there aren’t that many of them.  I especially liked how the author developed the bad guys, Jake in particular.

    A lot of the supporting cast have their own storylines, including one who wants to go kayaking to meet the Dalai Lama.  These disparate plotlines have their charm, but make the tale-telling somewhat unfocused, and I was left wondering what the main storyline was.  Fortunately, Straley anticipates this and enlightens the reader about halfway through the book: this is a story of two brothers coming to grips with their roles in life, and with each other as well.  Despite its dark moments, this is mostly a “feel good” novel.

    There are a ton of music references, including a number of obscure groups, which I liked.  There’s enough action scattered throughout the book to keep you from becoming bored with life in Cold Storage, and everything builds to a satisfying ending.  Those diverse and meandering supporting character storylines all get tied up in a clever “Months and Years Later” epilogue.  There’s some cussing and sex, but they help give the setting a “real” feel.  This is a standalone novel.

Kewlest New Word...

Mook (n.) : a stupid or incompetent person; a loser  (an Yankeeism)

Others : Gamelan (n.); Tenebrous (adj.).

Excerpts...

    In 1935, the town got an infusion of energy when a battered logger, a woman Wobbly, and her little girl with glasses fled the mine strike in Juneau in a leaky dory and made the place their home.  The logger was named Slippery Wilson.  The woman was named Ellie Hobbes.  She was a pilot and a committed anarchist.  The little girl with the thick glasses was Annabelle.  When Slip and Ellie built the first store, the old fishermen complained that the town was growing too fast.  But when Elie turned the store into a bar a few years later, the complaining stopped.   (loc. 209)

    “Did you want to talk to me, Miles”” she asked.

    “Well, not really.  I don’t know how I got into this really, but Billy wanted me to talk to you.

    “About what?”  She took a half step toward him, her forehead furrowed.

    “Well,” he said, “it’s kind of hard to explain, but he wants to break up with you because you saved his life and you remind him of Ed McMahon.”  (loc. 3199)

Kindle Details...

    Cold Storage, Alaska sells for $9.99 at Amazon.  The other two e-books that John Straley has available for the Kindle there sell for $7.59 and $9.99.

“Arguing with Lester was like arguing with the weather.”  (loc. 450)

    John Straley is apparently an established Mystery writer, and my local e-library listed Cold Storage, Alaska as being one.  It is not.  The author blends in a bunch of genres – humor (actually, more witty than out-and-out funny), action, drama, and even some romance.  There was also a smidgen of fantasy, in the form of some talking animals, though that was an awkward fit, and why Straley mixed that in is beyond me.

    Overall, this book reminded me very much of Norman Maclean’s critically-acclaimed A River Runs Through It, which I read years ago and is reviewed here.  Maclean’s book bored me to tears, but in fairness, this genre – let’s call it “warm and fuzzy lifestyles” is not my cup of tea.  Personally, I think Cold Storage, Alaska is a much better effort in this genre.

    7½ Stars.  Add 1 star if you live in, have visited, or are enchanted by America’s last frontier, Alaska.  Add another 1 star if you liked the book, A River Runs Through It.  I don’t know whether to pity you or be jealous.

The Attic Piranhas - Marlin Williams

    2014; 182 pages.  New Author? : No.  Genre : Contemporary Fiction.  Overall Rating : 8*/10.

    Change is coming to the Elegant Watch Company, where Max Fagan works.  No one buys mechanical watches anymore, and Elegant Watch has been slow to fathom this.  They've been losing money for some time.

    Change is also coming to Max Fagan’s life. Given his lack of funds – he’s about to be evicted from his apartment – and dead-end job, you’d think he’d embrace it.  But occasionally, some people need a bit of a push to get them out of their rut.  Enjoy your hot dog, Max.

What’s To Like...

    Marlin Williams has recently finished a significant revising of The Attic Piranhas.  I read the earlier version in December 2012.  The review is here, and I’ll try to keep duplication of it here to a minimum.  Besides, lots of the book’s details have changed and my memory is understandably fuzzy, so it was a pleasant re-read.

    The essence of TAP is similar to A Confederacy of Dunces (reviewed here).  The humor is both weird and madcap, the protagonist charismatically unlikeable (is that an oxymoron?), and both have hot dog vendors.  But The Attic Piranhas is shorter, its pacing faster, and Max has a few more redeeming qualities than Ignatius.

    It also seemed like the storyline in the revised version is now more focused.  Charley and the Attic Piranhas are more clearly portrayed (they are also defined in the Amazon blurb, as well as in the second excerpt below) and the roles of Misters Wong and Sanderson now seem to fit more deftly into the plotline.  Of course, it is equally possible that the second reading just increased my understanding of what was going on.

    There’s a nice moral to the story about the impact of negative thoughts and feelings; and the author manages to pull this off without getting preachy.  The ending closes out the story neatly.  There’s no booze, drugs, or adult situations to offend sensitive minds, and just a single “sh*t” near the beginning.  So both YA and adult readers will enjoy this book.

Excerpts...

    “Hey,” Max pointed to the pocket, “I gave you a twenty-dollar bill.  Where’s my change?”

    The vendor’s grin broadened.  “Change come from within.”

    “I’m talking about my money.”

    “Money,” Mr. Wong shook his head, “no matter.”  Then as he nodded, he said, “Change matter.”  (loc. 56)

    Charley stopped parading around on the scaffold and put a hand to his ear.  “Hear that?”

    Somewhere in the distance, Max could hear a faint rumble; it was almost like the sound he made when he blew bubbles through a straw into his glass of chocolate milk.

    Charley dropped his hand away from his ear.  “They’re coming.”

    “They?”

    “The attic piranhas.”  Charley tapped a finger against his forehead.  “You know, those little things that gnaw at you.  If you stand here much longer trying to make a decision, they’re going to catch up with you and eat you alive.  I’m not talking metaphorically, pal.  I’ve seen it happen a few times and it’s not a pretty sight.”  (loc. 590)

Kindle Details...

    The Attic Piranhas sells for $4.99 at Amazon; and ANAICT, this is Marlin Williams’ only full-length novel available for the Kindle.  He has seven short stories also for the Kindle, all priced $0.99, plus one collection of Short Stories, priced $4.99.

”A mind driven by indecision goes nowhere.”  (loc. 585)

    Overall, I felt like this version of The Attic Piranhas was a lot more polished and easier to follow than the 2012 edition.  There were still one or two “rough spots”.  The “Rolling Stone infringement” issue gets resolved too casually.  Mr. Sanderson’s new assistant turns out to be a relative of another character, which is either incredibly coincidental or a deliberate tie-in that flew over my head.  And I still feel Ramir’s entrance is a bit abrupt.  But I quibble.

    Simply put, if you've read John Kennedy Toole’s A Confederacy of Dunces and liked it, then you’ll love The Attic Piranhas.  If you haven’t read ACOD, then if things like anti-heroes, crazy antics, karmic comeuppances, and a tinge of the paranormal appeal to your reading tastes; you will enjoy this book.

    8 Stars.  Add 1 star if you think Ignatius Reilly was annoyingly charming.

Kavalier and Clay - Michael Chabon

   2000; 636 pages. Full Title : The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay.  New Author? : No.    Genre : Contemporary Literature.  Laurels : Pulitzer Prize winner – 2001.  Overall Rating : 9½*/10.

   19-year-old Joe Kavalier has just arrived in New York City from Prague, fleeing Nazi persecution.  He can do marvelous drawings, but obviously knows only fragmentary English.

    He’s staying at his aunt’s house, rooming with his cousin, 17-year-old Sammy Clay.  Sammy’s artistic talent is marginal, but he has a way with words, and has an inexhaustible trove of catchy plotlines.

    They have the talent and potential to be a top-flight comic book team, and rake in some big bucks.  But it’s a jungle out there for a pair of naïve teenagers, and life will throw a lot of distractions at them.  Can they stay focused and overcome the challenges?  Come on, they’re teenagers.

What’s To Like...
     The writing is elegant, and it’s easy to see why Kavalier & Clay won a Pulitzer Prize.  The character-development is wonderful, and the three main characters – Joe, Sammy, and Rosa – make for an a surprisingly original love triangle.

    There are a bunch of themes running throughout the book – Houdini-esque magic tricks, business deals, anti-Semitism, love, hatred, the challenge of emigrating to a new country – but the main ones are life in pre-WW2 America in general (especially for its Jewish citizens), and the golden era of comic books in particular.  They are all superbly done.  Oh, “gayness before it was acceptable” is also dealt with, so if you’re a homophobe, you probably won’t like this book.

    There are a few adult situations and language, but really not enough to call it R-rated.  There is some, but not a lot, of action; and just enough humor (primarily Sammy’s remarkable wit) to season the story properly.

    It took me about 100 pages to get used to Chabon’s writing style, but once I did, this became quite the page-turner for me.  And character-driven stories are generally not my genre.

Kewlest New Word...
Aetataureate (adj.)  :  of the “golden years”.  Here, the phrase is “the aetataureate delusion”, which seems to refer to the (apparently false) notion that old age is fun.

Excerpts...
    Although Joe had never forgotten the girl whom he had surprised that morning in Jerry Glovsky’s bedroom, he saw that, in his nocturnal reimaginings of the moment, he had badly misremembered her.  He never would have recalled her forehead as so capacious and high, her chin so delicately pointed.  In fact, her face would have seemed overlong were it not counterbalanced by an extravagant flying buttress of a nose.  Her rather small lips were set in a bright red hyphen that curved downward just enough at one corner to allow itself to be read as a smirk of amusement, from which she herself was not exempted, at the surrounding tableau of human vanity.  (pg. 237)

    “So,” said Bacon, what’s he so hot to trot about?”
    “His girl,” said Sammy.  “Miss Rosa Luxemburg Saks.”
    “I see.”  Bacon had a little bit of a southern accent.  “She a foreigner, too?”
    “Yeah, she is,” Sammy said.  “She’s from Greenwich Village.”
    “I’ve heard of it.”
    “It’s a pretty backward place.”
    “Is it?”
    “The people are little more than savages.”
    “I hear they eat dogs there.”
    “Rosa can do amazing things with dog.”  (pg. 302)

“Praise means so much when it comes from a lunatic.”  (pg. 539)
    The first half of the book – from Joe’s arrival in NYC in 1939 until December 7^th 1941, borders on being perfect.  Then the storyline gets a tad disjointed, as we jump instantly to Joe’s tenure in Antarctica, and his subsequent going to ground.  The ending takes place in 1954, and is somewhat contrived, but frankly, I don't think there’s any adequate way to end a complex story like this.

    You can tell Chabon did a lot of research into the time period used and the world of comic books.  The result is a detailed, authentic-feeling, including real people like Salvador Dali and Orson Welles making cameo appearances.

    9½ Stars.  10 Stars for the first half; 9 stars for the second half.  This is truly a masterpiece.

Watership Down - Richard Adams

   1972; 475 pages.  New Author? : Yes.  Laurels : 1972 Guardian Prize; 1972 Carnegie Medal; the best-selling Penguin Books novel of all time; #42 in the 2003 Big Read survey of the “Greatest Books of all time”.  Genre : Contemporary Fiction.  Overall Rating : 10*/10.

    According to the rabbit Fiver, something catastrophic is about to happen to the home rabbit hole.  He may or may not be prescient, and he’s short on details; so most of the other rabbits don’t believe him when he says the warren needs to be abandoned at once.

    But Hazel does.  So the two of them, along with nine other bucks, embark upon a long journey to establish a new colony.  It will be fraught with danger, and none of them know exactly where they’re going.  All they can do is hope that Fiver will “sense” the right spot.

What’s To Like...
     The rabbits (and most of the other animals) are anthropomorphic.  They can talk, dream, plan strategies, sing, play a game called bob-stones, and even problem-solve.  But they’re still rabbits who like to do rabbity things – eat clover, frolic in the sun, and occasionally sneak down to some farmer’s vegetable patch to munch on some delicious carrots or lettuce.

    The pacing is good – no small feat when the subject is the rabbits’ habits.  The characters aren’t terribly deep, but they aren’t 2-D either.  Hazel is not a Mary Sue.  He sometimes makes wrong decisions and gets jealous if another rabbit shows leadership qualities.  The antagonist, General Woundwort, is superbly rendered.  He may be a big bad bully, but he has some good points too.  The ultimate resolution of him is a stroke of genius.  Kehaar is a hoot.  Well, a squawk, actually.

    The book is divided into 50 chapters.  Each starts off with a neat little literary excerpt.  There’s a map at the front of the book, but in my version it was poorly done and you don’t really need it to follow the storyline.  There’s also a 3-page glossary of rabbit-speak (called “Lapine”)  in the back.  This does come in handy, as Richard Adams uses these bunny words frequently, and to good effect.

    The rabbits in Watership Down love to tell stories, which make for refreshing breaks in the narrative.  Most of them are oral legends concerning El-ahrairah, a legend among rabbits.  And at one point, Adams apparently “writes himself into a corner”.  No problem; he just labels the next chapter “Dea ex Machina”, and contrives a way out of the plotline fix.  I think that’s cool.

Kewlest New Word. . .
Lollop (v.)  :  to move in an ungainly manner in a series of clumsy paces or bounds.

Excerpts...
    “And Frith called after him, “El-ahrairah, your people cannot rule the world, for I will not have it so.  All the world will be your enemy, Prince with a Thousand Enemies, and whenever they catch you, they will kill you.  But first they must catch you, digger, listener, runner, prince with the swift warning.  Be cunning and full of tricks and your people shall never be destroyed.”  (pg. 60)

    Many human beings say that they enjoy the winter, but what they really enjoy is feeling proof against it.  For them there is no winter food problem.  They have fires and warm clothes.  The winter cannot hurt them and therefore increases their sense of cleverness and security.  For birds and animals, as for poor men, winter is another matter.  (pg. 465)

“Foxes here, weasels there, Fiver in the middle, begone dull care!”  (pg. 24)
    There is a movie version of Watership Down which, along with The Point, are probably my two favorite animated films of all time.  It’s been a while since I’ve watched it, but it seems to me that I thought Hazel was a “she” in the movie.  The book seems more “focused” (for lack of a better term), but maybe that’s because it includes a bunch of side-stories and details that inevitably have to be omitted from any film based on a novel.  Or maybe it’s just that I was probably wasted when I watched the movie.

    Watership Down is a standalone novel that will captivate any and all who read it.  Little girls will love the bunnies.  Little boys will love the fighting.  Adults will enjoy a well-told, well-written tale.  The epilogue will leave a lump in your throat.

    I can’t think of any negatives to say, and when a book keeps me thoroughly entertained (and a slew of other readers, apparently – there are over 1200 reviews of this book on Amazon) with 475 pages about rabbits, I think that’s quite the accomplishment.  10 Stars.  A masterpiece.  And the movie is a 10*/10 as well.

Foucault's Pendulum - Umberto Eco

   1988; 533 pages.  New Author? : Yes.  Genre : Contemporary Fiction; Highbrow Literature.  Overall Rating : 8*/10.

    Where’s the Holy Grail?  What are the Rosicrucians hiding?  Who can tell me what the big secret is that the 32^nd level of the Masons are hiding?  Surely all of this is interconnected.  But how?

   Everybody and his brother are writing their theories about this, and submitting their manuscripts to Garamond Publishing.  It falls upon Casaubon and his two colleagues to read through all these submissions.

    To relieve their boredom, they decide for develop their own secret system, which they call “The Plan”.  It’s all a joke to begin with (Minnie Mouse is part of it), but with time they take their additions to it more seriously.

    Still, none of them loses sight that it’s all a hoax.  What harm could possibly come of their divertissement?

What’s To Like...
    It’s nice to read the work of a top-tier author every once in a while, just to be able to contrast it with “ordinary” storytelling.  The writing is smooth and complex, and the words that Umberto Eco chooses will have you scrambling repeatedly for a dictionary, even though the book was originally written in Italian.

    The main purpose of Foucault’s Pendulum is to extensively explore mystical experiences, arcane secrets, and clandestine societies.  Eco takes a refreshingly different approach - skepticism - and uses the protagonists to evaluate the subject in three separate lights.  He doesn’t give you any clear-cut answers at the end, but you will have lots to ponder, regardless of your spiritual persuasion.   

    There is some subtle humor – ghostwriting for Shakespeare and Cervantes, for instance.  There’s a lot of French (and a slew of other languages), but if you’re monolingual, you won’t be missing anything critical.  My Gnostics show up; that’s a personal plus.

    If there’s a lesson to take away from reading this book, it’s to beware of making a bunch of metaphysical sh*t up.  You might sell a few books and shill a few sheep, but if people start believing in your palaver and think you hold some super-duper secret, there’s no telling what lengths they’ll go to in order to pry it out of you.

Kewlest New Word...
Spagyric (n.) : an alchemist; esp. one who deals with the production of herbal medicines using alchemical procedures.  There were dozens of other kewl new words.  There are even a couple websites devoted solely to the big words in Foucault’s Pendulum.

Excerpts...
    The gods of the underworld were protecting us.  At that very moment Lorenza Pellegrini came in, more solar than ever, making Belbo brighten.  She saw the fliers and was curious.
    When she heard about the project of the firm next door, she said, “Terrific!  I have this fantastic friend, an ex-Tupamaro from Uruguay, who works for a magazine called Picatrix.  He’s always taking me to séances. There, I met a fantastic ectoplasm; he asks for me now every time he materializes!”  (pg. 223)

    “Ma gavte la nata.”
    Lorenza, still showing her pleasure at the invitation, asked Belbo what that meant.
    “It’s Turin dialect.  It means, literally, ‘Be so kind as to remove the cork.’  A pompous, self-important, overweening individual is thought to hold himself the way he does because of a cork stuck in his sphincter ani, which prevents his vaporific dignity from being dispersed.  The removal of the cork causes the individual to deflate, a process usually accompanied by a shrill whistle and the reduction of the outer envelope to a poor fleshless phantom of the former self.”
    “I didn’t know you could be so vulgar.”
    “Now you know.”  (pg. 418)

 “You three have been faking.  Beware of faking: people will believe you.”  (pg. 444)
    I read about one highbrow novel a year, so Foucault’s Pendulum meets my quota for 2013.  In 2012, it was Dostoevsky’s The Idiot (reviewed here); in 2011 it was Infinite Jest (reviewed here).

    They are all somewhat similar - the action is sparse; the emphasis is on the characters, the drama, and the philosophical musings.  They are slow reads, not something you want to try a skim through the night before a book report is due.

    But they are eminently worthwhile, primarily because they are so freaking well-written.  Highbrow literature may not keep you on the edge of your seat, but it will feed your literary soul.

     8 Stars.  I have Umberto Eco’s The Name Of The Rose sitting on my TBR shelf, but don’t be surprised if it becomes my 2014 highbrow book.