**spoiler alert** My first experience of Berkeley was a dream, a stolen week or so when, on one hand, I was trying to convince myself I could make it **spoiler alert** My first experience of Berkeley was a dream, a stolen week or so when, on one hand, I was trying to convince myself I could make it work with this person I loved, while simultaneously breaking apart inside under the emotional strain of pretending to be the person I believed she (and my family and society and the world) wanted me to be. Unable to come clean, to admit to myself or to her or to anyone else in my life what I was feeling, I instead let things fall apart in a way that was spectacularly painful for numerous people. But for snatches here and there during that week, those moments when I deluded myself into thinking that things might work, my life felt magical, and everything was wondrous and strange; not least of all Berkeley itself, the bustle of life along Telegraph Avenue fascinating to me, visiting, as I was, from the strip-mall-plastered cultural barrens of the San Fernando Valley.
Now, today, I live in Berkeley. I鈥檓 far more satisfied here than I ever was in Reseda or Van Nuys, but exposure has made the neighborhood, for all its beauty that I am grateful for each time I go for a stroll, mundane.
Michael Chabon is a novelist whose works, for me, have veered between the mundane and the transcendent. I doubt that if I were to first read The Mysteries of Pittsburgh today, it would resonate with me much at all, but it was the perfect book for that frightening first year out of college; the sense that Art Bechstein鈥檚 life is full of magical possibilities seeped out of the pages and into my own existence. And The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay is one of the most shimmering, revelatory works I鈥檝e ever read. Meanwhile, The Yiddish Policemen鈥檚 Union, despite its alternate-history setting and its unlikely mixture of cultural influences and literary styles, was intellectually engaging to me but never got my emotions off the ground. As I ventured into his latest novel, Telegraph Avenue, I wondered if the landscape of its pages would more closely resemble the real one I lived in day in and day out, or the magical one in my painful, dreamlike memories.
Telegraph Avenue is the story of two deeply intertwined families. Gwen Shanks and Archy Stallings make up one of those families. Stallings is a wonderfully fitting last name for Archy, who has a habit of postponing every major decision life demands he make. (There are echoes here of Grady Tripp, the writer and professor at the center of Chabon鈥檚 novel Wonder Boys. Both men are reluctant to confront the realities of their lives, which put increasing pressure on them to become more reliable and responsible.) Gwen is a midwife, one half of the Berkeley Birth Partners, and is also pregnant, which is just one of the many factors encouraging Archy to re-evaluate his personal behavior and his professional situation. That situation involves running Brokeland Records, a beloved but not especially profitable independent record store. Gwen鈥檚 fellow Berkeley Birth Partner is Aviva Roth-Jaffe, while Archy runs Brokeland with Gwen鈥檚 husband, Nat Jaffe. Both of these longstanding partnerships are shaken up in the summer of 2004, as Brokeland is threatened by plans to build a chain megamall in the area, and Gwen has a heated confrontation with a racist doctor who then takes actions which could result in the Berkeley Birth Partners losing their license to practice.
Complicating matters between the families even further, Archy鈥檚 teenage son Titus, with whom he鈥檚 had no contact, arrives in their lives, and Julius 鈥淛ulie鈥� Jaffe, Aviva and Nat鈥檚 teenage son, becomes smitten with him.
For the novel鈥檚 first 400 pages or so, I felt that the East Bay in its pages was the one right outside my window, that one I set foot in every day. I grew to love its characters and admired how Chabon explored issues of race and privilege between them in ways that was always compassionate and humanizing for all involved. At one point, Gwen vents, 鈥淚鈥檓 sick of having no power in this game, Aviva鈥f always fighting against feeling useless. Of how sad it makes me feel that sisters won鈥檛 go to a midwife. Also, frankly, I鈥檓 sick of overprivileged, neurotic, crazy-ass (white ladies) with their white-lady latex allergies, and their white-lady OCD birth plans, and that bullshit white-lady machismo competition thing they all get into.鈥�
By the time Gwen goes on this tear, we鈥檝e spent enough time with her to not be taken aback or alienated by her anger, but to understand that of course she would feel this way. We also understand why Aviva is hurt by Gwen鈥檚 words.
But in its final stretch, Telegraph Avenue becomes tinged with transcendence. Like the zeppelin that represents the Dogpile corporation which seeks to build that megamall that threatens Brokeland鈥檚 existence taking flight, Telegraph Avenue finally found some emotional lift. It is a novel that understands that things don鈥檛 always work out the way we want them to, but that we usually find a way to carry on and to take our pain with us. In its closing passages, my heart was pierced by the evolving relationship of Julie and Titus, a complex and in many ways unsatisfactory love that endures in a way that is both tremendously limited and tremendously liberating. As I finished the novel, I realized that the dreamlike East Bay of that stolen week and the East Bay of my day-to-day life are, of course, one and the same....more
Another very good entry in Philip Kerr's series of historical crime novels featuring Bernie Gunther, this wonderfully vivid, achingly romantic novel cAnother very good entry in Philip Kerr's series of historical crime novels featuring Bernie Gunther, this wonderfully vivid, achingly romantic novel connects events in Bernie's life that take place in Germany in 1934 with events that occur in Havana in 1954. Bernie always seems to find his way into the presence of historical dictators, corrupt officials and mobsters, and the events of this book are no exception. What's fascinating about If the Dead Rise Not and about all of Gunther's adventures is the way in which he, a basically decent, believably flawed man, struggles to find a somewhat moral path through some of the most immoral landscapes of the last century. This novel languishes a bit more than some of the other, more consistently suspenseful entries, but in the end, it delivers some immensely satisfying revelations that made the whole thing worth it for me....more
McEwan is an absolute master at laying the psychologies of his characters bare, and as a result, I often find myself sympathizing with words spoken orMcEwan is an absolute master at laying the psychologies of his characters bare, and as a result, I often find myself sympathizing with words spoken or actions taken by his characters that might otherwise seem nigh unforgivable. In this sense, I think of him as a great moral writer, gently advising us not to be so quick to judge each other, for we perhaps cannot fathom the inner forces that twist the psyches and emotions of our fellow human beings, just as they cannot always fathom the forces that might be at work inside us. If only we could be completely honest with each other, communicate with each other clearly, free of anxiety, fear, the expectations of society. But for McEwan's characters (and often for those of us in the real world), such elements always intrude, always complicate matters. In this short novel, McEwan turns his all-seeing gaze on a honeymooning couple in the early 1960s; the notions of what the night "should" be and the pressures of sexual expectation, weigh heavily on the two virgins and on young Florence in particular. The intimate and fascinating tour McEwan takes us on of the inner lives of the characters and the experiences and expectations that each brings with them to that honeymoon suite makes it impossible for us (or at least for me) to judge them too harshly, even when they are cruel to each other. I see them as victims of the expectations laid upon them, making it impossible for them to see each other clearly or to communicate honestly, and I think McEwan is brilliant in the way that he illuminates how one word spoken or not spoken, one action taken or not taken, can alter the courses of entire lives....more
I don't read much fantasy. Most of the admittedly little I attempt to read just doesn't hold my interest, and when it involves clear forces of good fiI don't read much fantasy. Most of the admittedly little I attempt to read just doesn't hold my interest, and when it involves clear forces of good fighting clear forces of evil, my brain always makes unfavorable comparisons between it and Tolkien's Lord of the Rings trilogy, which captured my heart at an early age. But, compelled both by the raves of a number of friends and by the tremendous praise the HBO adaptation has received, I decided to give Martin's A Game of Thrones saga a chance, and I'm glad I did.
While a story like The Lord of the Rings is a heroic quest in the sense dating back through thousands of years of oral tradition, A Game of Thrones is more like, as someone described it to me, The Sopranos with swords. Here, we have not just clear forces of good and evil, but complex shades of gray, along with political machinations and betrayals so shocking they twisted my stomach in knots. Characters are vivid, complicated and believable. By the end of this volume, things are such a glorious political mess that I have absolutely no idea of where things are going to go from here, no do I know how I want them to go. My feelings as a reader are torn, though there are a few characters I hate with the fire of a thousand suns and who I look forward to seeing reach a spectacular comeuppance at some point down the line. Thus far, though, the series is delightfully unpredictable, so I have no way of knowing if such a comeuppance awaits those most despicable characters, and given that Martin has already demonstrated a willingness to kill off likable characters that rivals that of the television show 24, I'm sure that whatever victories the forces of relative good may achieve in the future will come at a painful cost. It's that unpredictability, that sense of life and death and chaos with which the tale is imbued, that made it captivating to me. While seven more hefty volumes seems a long and daunting road and I'm not sure if Martin can sustain my interest for quite that long (if he even lives to finish the tale), I am, for the moment, hooked. ...more
This is not a book with which to begin your relationship with Henning Mankell's moody detective, Kurt Wallander. This is a novel purely for those who This is not a book with which to begin your relationship with Henning Mankell's moody detective, Kurt Wallander. This is a novel purely for those who have formed a connection with Wallander over the many preceding novels. I find Wallander one of the most richly human characters I've encountered in fiction--believably flawed and lonely and morose (perhaps because I am always flawed and sometimes lonely and morose, myself)--and I was a bit saddened, going into this book, knowing that it was to be the last Wallander novel.
The mystery here is not as gripping and pulse-pounding as those in some earlier books, which was a bit disappointing. But the slower pace allows more time for Wallander to simply be Wallander, and the nature of the case creates reasons for Wallander to spend time with his daughter. Their thorny relationship has always been one of my favorite aspects of the books, and it gets plenty of focus here.
For me, the most deeply unnerving portions of this book had nothing to do with the crime Wallander investigates, but rather with another, more immediate threat he faces. And the ending is not the one I wanted for Wallander, but it is a deeply human ending, and I respect Mankell for not compromising in the final moments of his time with his most famous and beloved character.
It's probably silly of me to hold out hope for some Linda Wallander mysteries now, but I can't help it....more
Zero History provides a big end to the Bigend books. (Sorry, I couldn't resist.)
I find the development of Gibson's storytelling fascinating. His firsZero History provides a big end to the Bigend books. (Sorry, I couldn't resist.)
I find the development of Gibson's storytelling fascinating. His first three novels, the trilogy started by Neuromancer, took place in a world in which people could jack in to a vast network on which information was represented visually. It was a visionary concept, and Gibson used it beautifully--those books were never, first and foremost, about cyberspace, but about how the its human characters interfaced with cyberspace, how technology shapes lives.
His most recent trilogy (assuming Gibson doesn't continue with these characters in whatever he writes next--I don't think he will) takes place in our world. The characters use iPhones and laptops and Google. Gibson no longer needs to envision technology that doesn't exist to explore the thematic territory he likes to inhabit. We're there now. I thought at least the Festo Air Penguin which figures importantly in Zero History was an invention of Gibson's, but go to Youtube and sure enough, there it is, floating beautifully around in the well-lit lobby of an office building--its natural habitat?
Gibson writes in high definition. A huge percentage of Zero History is spent describing things in sometimes minute detail. As a result I sometimes find, reading his books, that I start to lose the forest amidst all the intricately detailed trees. I don't always mind--I often find myself coming back to his books a second time, when the pieces of the plot fall more clearly into place for me. Certainly Zero History has no shortage of almost absurdly precise details, but I felt more immediately engaged with the characters here than I did in Spook Country. This is probably as much due to the key players here being people I felt I'd come to know from the earlier books as from Gibson telling a story with more emotional weight than his last novel carried. (Milgrim, in particular, really comes into his own here as a likable character of surprising nuance and a frequent source of humor.) Zero History is deeply connected to Pattern Recognition and Spook Country, and I can't imagine anyone going in not having read those earlier novels getting the full impact of this novel's best moments, which bring the trilogy full circle and take the themes of Pattern Recognition in some surprising and rather brilliant new directions.
Hubertus Bigend may not be a real figure, but he certainly represents something real. Something both dangerous and exciting. He sets things in motion, and he may arrive at a point where he is going to dramatically, irrevocably change the world. The characters of this trilogy constantly find themselves being caught up in his machinations, or reacting to having been previously caught up in them. They usually seem to dislike it. I don't know that I would like it any more than they do, but I've definitely enjoyed riding along with them on these adventures.
I know that shoddy, half-assed police work happens everywhere, all the time, but still, when a writer generates suspense by making police reluctant toI know that shoddy, half-assed police work happens everywhere, all the time, but still, when a writer generates suspense by making police reluctant to properly investigate leads that seem extremely promising, I feel like they're cheating. That was an issue I had with this book. Additionally, I found the plot particularly far-fetched, or at least one aspect of it too underdeveloped to properly support what happens.
And yet, I still thoroughly enjoyed reading this book. The unforgettable crime that opens the novel had me hooked, and while we don't get to know her nearly as well as we come to know Mankell's Kurt Wallander, I found Birgitta Roslin an engaging and human protagonist, and appreciated the ways that concerns about her marriage and her lifelong friendships are woven into this crime tale.
Mankell always has some social or geopolitical concern running beneath each of his mysteries, and The Man from Beijing is more upfront about it than any of his books I've read since the Wallander novel The White Lioness. I think the concerns here could have been handled with a bit more subtlety and elegance, but thematic subtlety has never been one of Mankell's strong suits. I did like how this story, which takes place in 2006 for the most part, is connected to events set in 1863, but I tend to love tales that consider the way the past is still alive in the present. (David Mitchell's incredible Cloud Atlas, for instance.) Although it felt a bit unfocused and didn't hold together quite as well as I would have liked, I still found that Mankell's straightforward writing made this very readable, and it was nice to have a Mankell mystery to hold me over a bit as I wait for the next Wallander book, The Troubled Man, to be released here in the U.S. on March 29th of next year....more
A young clerk with the Dutch East Indies Company arrives in 1799 at the port of Dejima in Nagasaki Harbor, part of a team whose goal is to root out thA young clerk with the Dutch East Indies Company arrives in 1799 at the port of Dejima in Nagasaki Harbor, part of a team whose goal is to root out the corruption that plagues the company's business there. Young Jacob de Zoet hopes only to be honest and successful and to return to Holland with enough money to earn his beloved's hand in marriage.
What ends up happening during Jacob's tenure in Dejima outstrips anything he could have imagined upon arriving, and anything I imagined in the early pages of this book. Thousand Autumns lacks the virtuosic literary trickery of Mitchell's astounding Cloud Atlas, in which he amazes the reader by shifting from one literary style to another to another, in a dazzling gimmick that is more than just a gimmick, but an integral part of the book's thematic meaning. But I found Thousand Autumns, in its own way, almost as dazzling. The narrative strands that he conjures out of this tale, carrying it in so many directions, were a constant source of surprise. There are sweeping romances, compelling political intrigues, gut-wrenching betrayals, and pulse-pounding thriller elements, complete with a charismatic and insane villain who you will love to hate. And as diverse as the story strands are, they each feel like an organic part of the whole of the life and tale of Jacob de Zoet and his time in Dejima. The characters who make their way into and out of his tale are some of the most vivid I've encountered on the page. And as with Cloud Atlas, when I closed Thousand Autumns after reading its beautiful final pages, I felt a melancholy tug of memory looking back on the incredible story as a whole, for this was a book that I feel I almost lived rather than read. ...more
Reading novels by Murakami feels almost meditative to me. The dreamlike logic of his stories can be transportive. And while the memoir What I Talk AboReading novels by Murakami feels almost meditative to me. The dreamlike logic of his stories can be transportive. And while the memoir What I Talk About When I Talk About Running has no disappearing ladies or talking cats, I found reading it to be a similarly soothing, immensely pleasurable experience. Murakami's voice--at least as translated here by Philip Gabriel--is so pleasant and warm that reading this book felt like listening to a good friend. This is certainly a minor work in the Murakami oeuvre, but it's one that I think most admirers of Murakami's work will enjoy. I found the connections he explores here between his life as a runner and as a writer absolutely fascinating, and while Murakami makes it clear that this is not a fitness book or a self-help book, I felt that there was a lot of simple wisdom about the value of sheer determination on its pages, and I don't think one needs to be a runner (I'm not) to find value and enjoyment in his explorations here. Mostly, though, I was just grateful to be given this relatively rare, insightful glimpse at the writer whose novels have taken me to such strange and lovely places....more
With the words "Not tonight, my man," a stickup takes a bad turn and a young man is killed. Following this collision of people from very different sidWith the words "Not tonight, my man," a stickup takes a bad turn and a young man is killed. Following this collision of people from very different sides of the Lower East Side, the novel turns its very human gaze on the victims and the perpetrators, as well as on the veteran cop heading the investigation. I found myself deeply concerned with all the characters and fascinated by the very different ways in which each one responded to the tragedy--one finds his life falling apart; another tries to capitalize on it for his own gain--and transported to its New York City, where the happening Berkmann's Cafe that represents one character's life contrasts so sharply with the miserable apartment in the projects that another character calls home.
I think this is a great American crime novel, and a great and humanizing novel about life in an American city in the early 21st century.
A very minor point of frustration: Price gets all the details of the time just right--when the characters discuss movies, or when a TV show is on, they are all authentic films and shows of the period--but on those occasions when video games are mentioned, the titles are completely made up. I wish he'd taken a moment to get real titles; the fake ones pull me out of the moment the same way hearing Atari 2600 Pac-Man sound effects from an Xbox game can pull me out of a movie.
But again, this is a minor point. These well-worn, deeply human characters have taken up residence in my mind, and the phrase "Not tonight, my man" and all of its repurcussions continue to reverberate inside me....more
It's sort of a shame that Jonathan Lethem isn't a full-time crime novelist, because I would gladly read the further adventures of Lionel Essrog, the TIt's sort of a shame that Jonathan Lethem isn't a full-time crime novelist, because I would gladly read the further adventures of Lionel Essrog, the Tourettic detective at the heart of Motherless Brooklyn. Like a great origin story for a superhero, I came away from this novel with a deep understanding of the events that had made Lionel who he was, and with a desire to follow him through his career. Motherless Brooklyn has great New York atmosphere, wonderful characters, and makes delightful use of language, thanks largely to Lionel's frequent Tourettic outbursts. (I saw a sign on a Subway restaurant the other day that said "Morninoonight." I think one glimpse of that sign might drive Lionel insane. It almost drove me insane.) I found the final chapter particularly lovely and affecting, and won't soon forget the sound of Lionel Essrog telling his story in my head.
Started some weeks before my first trip to New York City and finally finished on the flight home, I found Lethem's Chronic City alternately engaging aStarted some weeks before my first trip to New York City and finally finished on the flight home, I found Lethem's Chronic City alternately engaging and difficult, frequently brilliant and sometimes oddly beautiful. The narrator, former child actor Chase Insteadman, is something of a blank slate, a fixture on the Manhattan social scene more treasured not for any personality of his own but because his fiancee is one of the heroic astronauts stranded on a space station behind a field of mines, and she writes him piercingly beautiful letters which are printed in the New York Times for all to read. To me, Chronic City is ultimately a story about Chase's desire to become a real person rather than just a mirror for the projections of others, and though I found reading it to sometimes be a struggle, in the end I was glad to have read it. It is certainly a memorable, ambitious and, I think, meaningful work. In particular I won't soon forget the marvelous Perkus Tooth, a film scholar of sorts who finds meaning in everything from The Muppet Movie (called The Gnuppet Movie in this universe) to the Steve Martin comedy Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid (which here is called Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid). I also loved the occasionally surprising way that Lethem worked concerns about virtual worlds like Second Life and the blurring between the reality (?) of Manhattan and the unreality (?) of such worlds into the narrative.
I went to New York partially because I wanted to reconcile the city I've encountered in so many films and books with the reality of the actual place, but the funny thing is that I'm only more amazed by the city than ever after briefly experiencing it myself. Lethem's surreal portrayal of Manhattan, with its heavy symbolic fog covering the southern part of the island and with its tiger on the loose, wrecking ravaging bodegas in the night and with its lovely little Chinese garden at the Met, will probably remain in some way intertwined with my actual memories of the city. The little Chinese garden at the Met is beautiful....more
It's as if Stieg Larsson peeked into my head and designed his Millenium thrillers for my enjoyment. The heroine of these novels, Lisbeth Salander, appIt's as if Stieg Larsson peeked into my head and designed his Millenium thrillers for my enjoyment. The heroine of these novels, Lisbeth Salander, appeals to me tremendously. Of course, that's probably in part because she's socially awkward enough to make a goofball like me seem like a fantastic conversationalist, but it's also because she's incredibly smart, tough and, in her own, damaged way, very confident.
But while Lisbeth understandably gets most of the attention in the press, her co-star in this series, Mikael Blomqvist, is also very important to me. I've always romanticized crusading reporters shining a light on the injustices of the world, and Blomqvist is essentially my romanticized notion of the crusading reporter, there on the page. I love rooting for him. Spending time with these characters is inherently enjoyable to me.
There's nothing subtle about this story or the way in which it's told. At one point, Blomqvist flat-out states, "This story is not primarily about spies and secret government agencies; it's about violence against women, and the men who enable it." Much of the satisfaction of the Millenium stories has always been in seeing the ways in which Salander turns the tables on the men who try to victimize her. She is an avenging angel, and her actions seem meant to avenge not just her own sufferings, but those of victimized women everywhere. In this book, it's Salander fighting...well, "spies and secret government agencies" who have gone to great lengths to make her go away, for reasons I won't go into. I will say that the battle involves a courtroom scene that I found terrifically entertaining.
This isn't great literature, and the prose is pedestrian. It's also kind of comic book-y, with one villain (returning from the second book) being a giant who cannot feel pain. But it's great entertainment, terrifically plotted, with great characters and a strong moral center.
Unfortunately, this is the final book in the Millenium series. Larsson died after writing this volume. But I think it works quite well as a conclusion, and I very much like the note on which it ends....more
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