Jeri's bookshelf: all en-US Tue, 29 Apr 2025 04:27:22 -0700 60 Jeri's bookshelf: all 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg North Woods 71872930
When a pair of young lovers abscond from a Puritan colony, little do they know that their humble cabin in the woods will become home to an extraordinary succession of inhabitants . An English soldier, destined for glory, abandons the battlefields of the New World to devote himself to apples. A pair of spinster twins survive war and famine, only to succumb to envy and desire.A crime reporter unearths a mass grave, but finds the ancient trees refuse to give up their secrets. A lovelorn painter, a conman, a stalking panther, a lusty beetle; as each one confronts the mysteries of the north woods, they come to realize that the dark, raucous, beautiful past is very much alive.

Traversing cycles of history, nature, and even literature, North Woods shows the myriad, magical ways in which we’re connected to our environment and to one another, across time, language and space. Written along with the seasons and divided into the twelve months of the year, it is an unforgettable novel about secrets and fates that asks the timeless how do we live on, even after we’re gone?]]> 372 Daniel Mason 0593597036 Jeri 4 argosy-book-group 4.11 2023 North Woods
author: Daniel Mason
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2023
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/25
date added: 2025/04/29
shelves: argosy-book-group
review:
Review to TK. Man, this was a good book.
]]> <![CDATA[Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art]]> 48890486
There is nothing more essential to our health and well-being than breathing: take air in, let it out, repeat twenty-five thousand times a day. Yet, as a species, humans have lost the ability to breathe correctly, with grave consequences.

Journalist James Nestor travels the world to figure out what went wrong and how to fix it. The answers aren't found in pulmonology labs, as we might expect, but in the muddy digs of ancient burial sites, secret Soviet facilities, New Jersey choir schools, and the smoggy streets of Sao Paulo. Nestor tracks down men and women exploring the hidden science behind ancient breathing practices like Pranayama, Sudarshan Kriya, and Tummo and teams up with pulmonary tinkerers to scientifically test long-held beliefs about how we breathe.

Modern research is showing us that making even slight adjustments to the way we inhale and exhale can jump-start athletic performance; rejuvenate internal organs; halt snoring, asthma, and autoimmune disease; and even straighten scoliotic spines. None of this should be possible, and yet it is.

Drawing on thousands of years of medical texts and recent cutting-edge studies in pulmonology, psychology, biochemistry, and human physiology, Breath turns the conventional wisdom of what we thought we knew about our most basic biological function on its head. You will never breathe the same again.]]> 280 James Nestor 0735213615 Jeri 4 pleasure-read
In a wide-ranging discussion about writing, well-known North Carolina author Wiley Cash talked about how he gleaned some breathing techniques from Nester's book to calm in his monkey mind and help focus him on his writing. It was simply a passing reference in a conversation that lasted more than an hour. But I knew then it was time. I wasn't disappointed.

I knew I would like "Breath" because of what I learned through yoga and meditation. But what I didn't expect was how Nestor gave what would seem to be a mundane subject a real sense of tension and drama and downright surprises that made you turn the page. Nestor is quite the storyteller, an incredibly talented writer. He spent a decade digging into the research on breathing and delivers a captivating narrative brought by life by the characters he discovered and his own deep-dive into what he discovered. He became his own test subject, a guinea pig if you will. Nestor puts you at his hip and he jets around the world to talk to the key figures he found through his research, and as a reader, what you come away with is pretty astonishing.

Did I discover something I could use like Wiley did? Oh sure. But I also discovered something I didn't expect -- the art of narrative nonfiction and how to breathe life (pun intended) into a subject that would seem to be incredibly mundane. And that is why we read books, right? That sense of discovery. That's what makes it fun.]]> 4.13 2020 Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art
author: James Nestor
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.13
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2025/04/29
date added: 2025/04/29
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
For years, I had heard about James Nestor's book, "Breath." I heard podcasts where he was interviewed, and as someone who meditates every morning and has practiced yoga several times a week for more than 15 years, I had heard about the importance of breath so much it was like white noise in my brain. Nestor's book intrigued me. His interviews on various podcasts were good So, I was more than mildly interested. I knew I would dive into it � at some point. But what sent me looking for the book weeks ago was a discussion about the frustrating world of creativity.

In a wide-ranging discussion about writing, well-known North Carolina author Wiley Cash talked about how he gleaned some breathing techniques from Nester's book to calm in his monkey mind and help focus him on his writing. It was simply a passing reference in a conversation that lasted more than an hour. But I knew then it was time. I wasn't disappointed.

I knew I would like "Breath" because of what I learned through yoga and meditation. But what I didn't expect was how Nestor gave what would seem to be a mundane subject a real sense of tension and drama and downright surprises that made you turn the page. Nestor is quite the storyteller, an incredibly talented writer. He spent a decade digging into the research on breathing and delivers a captivating narrative brought by life by the characters he discovered and his own deep-dive into what he discovered. He became his own test subject, a guinea pig if you will. Nestor puts you at his hip and he jets around the world to talk to the key figures he found through his research, and as a reader, what you come away with is pretty astonishing.

Did I discover something I could use like Wiley did? Oh sure. But I also discovered something I didn't expect -- the art of narrative nonfiction and how to breathe life (pun intended) into a subject that would seem to be incredibly mundane. And that is why we read books, right? That sense of discovery. That's what makes it fun.
]]> <![CDATA[Dylan Goes Electric!: Newport, Seeger, Dylan, and the Night That Split the Sixties]]> 23460971 368 Elijah Wald 0062366688 Jeri 3
So, when I saw the film pulled from Elijah Wald's 2015 book, "Dylan Goes Electric," I put my name immediately onto a list at our local library. I was far from alone. I had to wait four months before "Dylan Goes Electric" was available. I then dove in. I liked it. But ....

First of all, I am no Dylanologist, like my good friend, Scott, a college professor who teaches a course on Dylan. So, I found myself poring through page after gate that felt like walking through mud. Elijah Wald did some incredible research to unearth a snapshot of that time when Dylan was young and unknown. But like many nonfiction writers I've read, I found him going into a lot of rabbit holes about tertiary characters to reveal a more comprehensive picture. That kind of deep dive research is needed, and if I was a Dylanologist, I would be hungry for those kind of details. But I am not, and the way I see it, that kind of research helps you write with authority and gives you an insight of what to leave in and -- what to leave out.

In the end, "Dylan Goes Electric" was a struggle for me. I ended up speed-reading through parts to get to Dylan passages because I had to get it back to the library to avoid a fine and get it for the next person on the list. And for me, that is no way to read a book, any book. ]]> 3.95 2015 Dylan Goes Electric!: Newport, Seeger, Dylan, and the Night That Split the Sixties
author: Elijah Wald
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.95
book published: 2015
rating: 3
read at: 2025/04/11
date added: 2025/04/13
shelves: pleasure-read, currently-reading
review:
Like many I expect, my wife Katherine and I went to see "A Complete Unknown." I liked it. Sure, I would imagine some of the scenes were pure fiction -- I mean, did Johnny Cash really meet up with Dylan at Newport and did Pete Seeger really pick an axe and try to cut the cable to end Dylan's electric set in March 1965? Who knows. But it made for a fun film, one that opened a cinematic window into a tumultuous time not unlike ours today.

So, when I saw the film pulled from Elijah Wald's 2015 book, "Dylan Goes Electric," I put my name immediately onto a list at our local library. I was far from alone. I had to wait four months before "Dylan Goes Electric" was available. I then dove in. I liked it. But ....

First of all, I am no Dylanologist, like my good friend, Scott, a college professor who teaches a course on Dylan. So, I found myself poring through page after gate that felt like walking through mud. Elijah Wald did some incredible research to unearth a snapshot of that time when Dylan was young and unknown. But like many nonfiction writers I've read, I found him going into a lot of rabbit holes about tertiary characters to reveal a more comprehensive picture. That kind of deep dive research is needed, and if I was a Dylanologist, I would be hungry for those kind of details. But I am not, and the way I see it, that kind of research helps you write with authority and gives you an insight of what to leave in and -- what to leave out.

In the end, "Dylan Goes Electric" was a struggle for me. I ended up speed-reading through parts to get to Dylan passages because I had to get it back to the library to avoid a fine and get it for the next person on the list. And for me, that is no way to read a book, any book.
]]> When Ghosts Come Home 56382097
When the roar of a low-flying plane awakens him in the middle of the night, Sheriff Winston Barnes knows something strange is happening at the nearby airfield on the coast of North Carolina. But nothing can prepare him for what he finds: a large airplane has crash-landed and is now sitting sideways on the runway, and there are no signs of a pilot or cargo. When the body of a local man is discovered—shot dead and lying on the grass near the crash site—Winston begins a murder investigation that will change the course of his life and the fate of the community that he has sworn to protect.

Everyone is a suspect, including the dead man. As rumors and accusations fly, long-simmering racial tensions explode overnight, and Winston, whose own tragic past has followed him like a ghost, must do his duty while facing the painful repercussions of old decisions. Winston also knows that his days as sheriff may be numbered. He’s up for re-election against a corrupt and well-connected challenger, and his deputies are choosing sides. As if these events weren’t troubling enough, he must finally confront his daughter Colleen, who has come home grieving a shattering loss she cannot fully articulate.

As the suspense builds and this compelling mystery unfolds, Wiley Cash delves deep into the hearts of these richly drawn, achingly sympathetic characters to reveal the nobility of an ordinary man struggling amidst terrifying, extraordinary circumstances.]]> 290 Wiley Cash 0062312669 Jeri 4 pleasure-read
Maybe it was because he based "The Last Ballad" on a dark chapter in the history of his hometown, Gastonia, NC, and he felt hemmed in by facts that always are stubborn. But with "When Ghosts Come Home," Cash let his imagination do jumping jacks without the worry of history or facts. What he came away with was quite the page turner in a usually sleepy part of North Carolina, a small town on the coast known as Oak Island.

I know that town well, and Cash setting the novel in the mid-1980s was a ncie time capsule to revisit, a time before cell phones, AI and divisive politics. Just plain old evil and greed.

Cash, who teaches creative writing at UNC-Asheville, is a master at his craft. And in "When Ghosts Come Home," he was at the time of his creative game. A joy to read. And quite the twist at the end. When I finished, I closed the book and went, "Damn."

Then I turned to the acknowledgements to glean something of how he came up with such a sordid, yet realistic tale of who we are. That's where I read this, addressed to his two young daughters: "Your mom and I hope to leave something of ourselves behind for you, and we hope to leave it behind in a less dangerous world."

Nice.

]]> 3.63 2021 When Ghosts Come Home
author: Wiley Cash
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.63
book published: 2021
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/16
date added: 2025/03/16
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
I've always enjoyed novels by Wiley Cash. I've read everything he's written, and of course, what I enjoy is that he sets his novels in a place I know well -- North Carolina. His third. novel, "The Last Ballad," left me a bit disappinted. Didn't grab me like his last two, "A Land More Kind Than Home" and "The Dark Road to Mercy."

Maybe it was because he based "The Last Ballad" on a dark chapter in the history of his hometown, Gastonia, NC, and he felt hemmed in by facts that always are stubborn. But with "When Ghosts Come Home," Cash let his imagination do jumping jacks without the worry of history or facts. What he came away with was quite the page turner in a usually sleepy part of North Carolina, a small town on the coast known as Oak Island.

I know that town well, and Cash setting the novel in the mid-1980s was a ncie time capsule to revisit, a time before cell phones, AI and divisive politics. Just plain old evil and greed.

Cash, who teaches creative writing at UNC-Asheville, is a master at his craft. And in "When Ghosts Come Home," he was at the time of his creative game. A joy to read. And quite the twist at the end. When I finished, I closed the book and went, "Damn."

Then I turned to the acknowledgements to glean something of how he came up with such a sordid, yet realistic tale of who we are. That's where I read this, addressed to his two young daughters: "Your mom and I hope to leave something of ourselves behind for you, and we hope to leave it behind in a less dangerous world."

Nice.


]]> Braving the Wilderness 34565022 #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER - A timely and important book that challenges everything we think we know about cultivating true belonging in our communities, organizations, and culture, from the #1 bestselling author of Rising Strong, Daring Greatly, and The Gifts of Imperfection

REESE’S BOOK CLUB PICK

"True belonging doesn't require us to change who we are. It requires us to be who we are." Social scientist Brené Brown, PhD, LMSW, has sparked a global conversation about the experiences that bring meaning to our lives--experiences of courage, vulnerability, love, belonging, shame, and empathy. In Braving the Wilderness, Brown redefines what it means to truly belong in an age of increased polarization. With her trademark mix of research, storytelling, and honesty, Brown will again change the cultural conversation while mapping a clear path to true belonging.

Brown argues that we're experiencing a spiritual crisis of disconnection, and introduces four practices of true belonging that challenge everything we believe about ourselves and each other. She writes, "True belonging requires us to believe in and belong to ourselves so fully that we can find sacredness both in being a part of something and in standing alone when necessary. But in a culture that's rife with perfectionism and pleasing, and with the erosion of civility, it's easy to stay quiet, hide in our ideological bunkers, or fit in rather than show up as our true selves and brave the wilderness of uncertainty and criticism. But true belonging is not something we negotiate or accomplish with others; it's a daily practice that demands integrity and authenticity. It's a personal commitment that we carry in our hearts." Brown offers us the clarity and courage we need to find our way back to ourselves and to each other. And that path cuts right through the wilderness. Brown writes, "The wilderness is an untamed, unpredictable place of solitude and searching. It is a place as dangerous as it is breathtaking, a place as sought after as it is feared. But it turns out to be the place of true belonging, and it's the bravest and most sacred place you will ever stand."]]> 197 Brené Brown 0812995848 Jeri 4 pleasure-read TK 4.11 2017 Braving the Wilderness
author: Brené Brown
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2017
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/09
date added: 2025/03/09
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
TK
]]> You Dreamed of Empires 127938747 From a visionary Mexican author, a hallucinatory, revelatory, colonial revenge story that reimagines the fall of Tenochtitlan.

One morning in 1519, conquistador Hernán Cortés entered the city of Tenochtitlan � today's Mexico City. Later that day, he would meet the emperor Moctezuma in a collision of two worlds, two empires, two languages, two possible futures.

Cortés was accompanied by his nine captains, his troops, and his two translators: Friar Aguilar, a taciturn, former slave, and Malinalli, a strategic, former princess. Greeted at a ceremonial welcome meal by the steely princess Atotoxli, sister and wife of Moctezuma, the Spanish nearly bungle their entrance to the city. As they await their meeting with Moctezuma � who is at a political, spiritual, and physical crossroads, and relies on hallucinogens to get himself through the day and in quest for any kind of answer from the gods � the Spanish are ensconced in the labyrinthine palace. Soon, one of Cortés’s captains, Jazmín Caldera, overwhelmed by the grandeur of the city, begins to question the ease with which they were welcomed into the city, and wonders at the risks of getting out alive, much less conquering the empire.

You Dreamed of Empires brings to life Tenochtitlan at its height, and reimagines its destiny. The incomparably original Alvaro Enrigue sets afire the moment of conquest and turns it into a moment of revolution, a restitutive, fantastical counter-attack, in a novel so electric and so unique that it feels like a dream.]]> 220 Álvaro Enrigue 059354479X Jeri 2 argosy-book-group 3.75 2022 You Dreamed of Empires
author: Álvaro Enrigue
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.75
book published: 2022
rating: 2
read at: 2025/02/18
date added: 2025/02/20
shelves: argosy-book-group
review:

]]> <![CDATA[You're Not Listening: What You're Missing and Why It Matters]]> 45892276 Who listens to you?

New York Times contributor Kate Murphy asked people on five continents this question, and the response was typically a long, awkward pause. People struggled to come up with someone, anyone, who truly listened to them without glazing over, glancing down at a phone, or jumping in to offer an opinion. Many admitted that they, themselves, weren’t very good listeners, and most couldn’t even describe what it meant to be a good listener.

Despite living in a world where technology allows constant digital communication and opportunities to connect, it seems no one is really listening or even knows how. And it’s making us lonelier, more isolated, and less tolerant than ever before. A listener by trade, Murphy wanted to know how we got here.

In this illuminating and often humorous deep dive, Murphy explains why we’re not listening, what it’s doing to us, and how we can reverse the trend. She makes accessible the psychology, neuroscience, and sociology of listening while also introducing us to some of the best listeners out there (including a CIA agent, focus-group moderator, bartender, radio producer, and top furniture salesman).

While listening is often regarded as talking’s meek counterpart, Murphy discovered it’s actually the more powerful position in communication. We learn when we listen. It’s how we connect, cooperate, empathize, and fall in love. Listening is something we do or don’t do every day. While we might take listening for granted, how well we listen, to whom, and under what circumstances determines who we are and the paths we take in life.

Equal parts cultural observation, scientific exploration, and rousing call to action that’s full of practical advice, You’re Not Listening is to listening what Susan Cain’s Quiet was to introversion. It’s time to stop talking and start listening.]]> 278 Kate Murphy 1250297192 Jeri 4 work-read 4.08 2020 You're Not Listening: What You're Missing and Why It Matters
author: Kate Murphy
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.08
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2025/02/02
date added: 2025/02/02
shelves: work-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[How to Know a Person: The Art of Seeing Others Deeply and Being Deeply Seen]]> 112974860 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER � A practical, heartfelt guide to the art of truly knowing another person in order to foster deeper connections at home, at work, and throughout our lives—from the author of The Road to Character and The Second Mountain

As David Brooks observes, “There is one skill that lies at the heart of any healthy person, family, school, community organization, or society: the ability to see someone else deeply and make them feel seen—to accurately know another person, to let them feel valued, heard, and understood.�

And yet we humans don’t do this well. All around us are people who feel invisible, unseen, misunderstood. In How to Know a Person, Brooks sets out to help us do better, posing questions that are essential for all of us: If you want to know a person, what kind of attention should you cast on them? What kind of conversations should you have? What parts of a person’s story should you pay attention to?

Driven by his trademark sense of curiosity and his determination to grow as a person, Brooks draws from the fields of psychology and neuroscience and from the worlds of theater, philosophy, history, and education to present a welcoming, hopeful, integrated approach to human connection. How to Know a Person helps readers become more understanding and considerate toward others, and to find the joy that comes from being seen. Along the way it offers a possible remedy for a society that is riven by fragmentation, hostility, and misperception.

The act of seeing another person, Brooks argues, is profoundly creative: How can we look somebody in the eye and see something large in them, and in turn, see something larger in ourselves? How to Know a Person is for anyone searching for connection, and yearning to be understood.]]> 304 David Brooks 059323006X Jeri 3 pleasure-read TK 4.09 2023 How to Know a Person: The Art of Seeing Others Deeply and Being Deeply Seen
author: David Brooks
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.09
book published: 2023
rating: 3
read at: 2025/01/04
date added: 2025/01/12
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
TK
]]> Iron Flame (The Empyrean, #2) 90202302 “The first year is when some of us lose our lives. The second year is when the rest of us lose our humanity.� —Xaden Riorson

Everyone expected Violet Sorrengail to die during her first year at Basgiath War College—Violet included. But Threshing was only the first impossible test meant to weed out the weak-willed, the unworthy, and the unlucky.

Now the real training begins, and Violet’s already wondering how she’ll get through. It’s not just that it’s grueling and maliciously brutal, or even that it’s designed to stretch the riders� capacity for pain beyond endurance. It’s the new vice commandant, who’s made it his personal mission to teach Violet exactly how powerless she is–unless she betrays the man she loves.

Although Violet’s body might be weaker and frailer than everyone else’s, she still has her wits—and a will of iron. And leadership is forgetting the most important lesson Basgiath has taught her: Dragon riders make their own rules.

But a determination to survive won’t be enough this year.

Because Violet knows the real secret hidden for centuries at Basgiath War College—and nothing, not even dragon fire, may be enough to save them in the end.]]> 623 Rebecca Yarros 1649374178 Jeri 4 pleasure-read TK 4.33 2023 Iron Flame (The Empyrean, #2)
author: Rebecca Yarros
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.33
book published: 2023
rating: 4
read at: 2025/01/11
date added: 2025/01/12
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
TK
]]> James 173754979 A brilliant reimagining of Adventures of Huckleberry Finn—both harrowing and satirical—told from the enslaved Jim's point of view

When Jim overhears that he is about to be sold to a man in New Orleans, separated from his wife and daughter forever, he runs away until he can formulate a plan. Meanwhile, Huck has faked his own death to escape his violent father. As all readers of American literature know, thus begins the dangerous and transcendent journey by raft down the Mississippi River toward the elusive and unreliable promise of the Free States and beyond.

Brimming with nuanced humor and lacerating observations that have made Everett a literary icon, this brilliant and tender novel radically illuminates Jim's agency, intelligence, and compassion as never before. James is destined to be a major publishing event and a cornerstone of twenty-first-century American literature.

Alternate cover edition of ISBN 9780385550369.]]> 303 Percival Everett Jeri 5 argosy-book-group Review TK 4.46 2024 James
author: Percival Everett
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.46
book published: 2024
rating: 5
read at: 2024/11/30
date added: 2024/11/30
shelves: argosy-book-group
review:
Review TK
]]> <![CDATA[Something Wicked This Way Comes]]> 248596 Something Wicked This Way Comes, now featuring a new introduction and material about its longstanding influence on culture and genre.

For those who still dream and remember, for those yet to experience the hypnotic power of its dark poetry, step inside. The show is about to begin. Cooger & Dark’s Pandemonium Shadow Show has come to Green Town, Illinois, to destroy every life touched by its strange and sinister mystery. The carnival rolls in sometime after midnight, ushering in Halloween a week early. A calliope’s shrill siren song beckons to all with a seductive promise of dreams and youth regained. Two boys will discover the secret of its smoke, mazes, and mirrors; two friends who will soon know all too well the heavy cost of wishes…and the stuff of nightmares.

Few novels have endured in the heart and memory as has Ray Bradbury’s unparalleled literary masterpiece Something Wicked This Way Comes. Scary and suspenseful, it is a timeless classic in the American canon.]]> 293 Ray Bradbury 0380729407 Jeri 4 pleasure-read
It reminded me of George Orwell's "Animal Farm." Except this time, the pigs were replaced by carnival performers Bradbury called "freaks" and how they stole people's souls by luring them into an evil carousel or a maze of mirrors. But beyond that it was an excellent example of stellar writing. Turn to any page. Any page. You'll see how Bradbury used inventive verbs and vivid descriptions to create scenes as captivating as any painting by Matisse.

And even with a book that came out more than six decades ago, it still felt fresh. Quite the read. And always will be.]]> 3.92 1962 Something Wicked This Way Comes
author: Ray Bradbury
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.92
book published: 1962
rating: 4
read at: 2024/11/13
date added: 2024/11/14
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
I picked up Ray Bradbury's classic from 1962 when I spotted The Atlantic cover right before the election. It showed an illustration from the back of Trump riding toward DC with a dilapidated U.S. Capitol on the horizon. I mean, that cover was scary. When I looked inside for an explanation, the artist wrote about using "Something Wicked This Way Comes" as a backdrop. So, I read it. I blazed through it. And I found it to be an excellent allegory of our present-day state of politics and America.

It reminded me of George Orwell's "Animal Farm." Except this time, the pigs were replaced by carnival performers Bradbury called "freaks" and how they stole people's souls by luring them into an evil carousel or a maze of mirrors. But beyond that it was an excellent example of stellar writing. Turn to any page. Any page. You'll see how Bradbury used inventive verbs and vivid descriptions to create scenes as captivating as any painting by Matisse.

And even with a book that came out more than six decades ago, it still felt fresh. Quite the read. And always will be.
]]> <![CDATA[The False White Gospel: Rejecting Christian Nationalism, Reclaiming True Faith, and Refounding Democracy]]> 195391633
It is time says Jim Wallis, to call out genuine faith―specifically the “Christian� in White Christian Nationalism―inviting all who can be persuaded to reject and help dismantle a false gospel that propagates white supremacy and autocracy. We need–to raise up the faith of all of us, and help those who are oblivious, stuck, and captive to the ideology and idolatry of White Christian Nationalism that is leading us to such great danger. Wallis turns our attention to six iconic texts at the heart of what genuine biblical faith means and what Jesus, in the gospels, has called us to do. It is time to ask do we believe these teachings or not?

This book isn’t only for Christians but for all faith traditions, and even those with no faith at all. When we see a civic promotion of fear, hate, and violence for the trajectory of our politics, we need a civic faith of love, healing, and hope to defeat it. And that must involve all of us–religious or not. Learning to practice a politics of neighbor love will be central to the future of democracy in America. And more than ever, the words of Jesus ring, “You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”]]> 286 Jim Wallis 1250291895 Jeri 4 pleasure-read 4.19 The False White Gospel: Rejecting Christian Nationalism, Reclaiming True Faith, and Refounding Democracy
author: Jim Wallis
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.19
book published:
rating: 4
read at: 2024/10/27
date added: 2024/11/12
shelves: pleasure-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Master of Change: How to Excel When Everything Is Changing, Including You; Embracing Life’s Instability with Rugged Flexibility―a Practical Model for Resilience]]> 75289864 240 Brad Stulberg 006325316X Jeri 5 work-read 3.99 Master of Change: How to Excel When Everything Is Changing, Including You; Embracing Life’s Instability with Rugged Flexibility―a Practical Model for Resilience
author: Brad Stulberg
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.99
book published:
rating: 5
read at: 2024/09/28
date added: 2024/09/28
shelves: work-read
review:
My most impactful book I've read in years. A bigger review to come. After finishing it right before daybreak, gotta process this.
]]> <![CDATA[When We Cease to Understand the World]]> 62069739
Shortlisted for the 2021 International Booker Prize and the 2021 National Book Award for Translated Literature

A fictional examination of the lives of real-life scientists and thinkers whose discoveries resulted in moral consequences beyond their imagining.

When We Cease to Understand the World is a book about the complicated links between scientific and mathematical discovery, madness, and destruction.

Fritz Haber, Alexander Grothendieck, Werner Heisenberg, Erwin Schrödinger—these are some of luminaries into whose troubled lives Benjamín Labatut thrusts the reader, showing us how they grappled with the most profound questions of existence. They have strokes of unparalleled genius, alienate friends and lovers, descend into isolation and insanity. Some of their discoveries reshape human life for the better; others pave the way to chaos and unimaginable suffering. The lines are never clear.

At a breakneck pace and with a wealth of disturbing detail, Labatut uses the imaginative resources of fiction to tell the stories of the scientists and mathematicians who expanded our notions of the possible.]]> 193 Benjamín Labatut Jeri 4 argosy-book-group Review comin' 4.10 2020 When We Cease to Understand the World
author: Benjamín Labatut
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.10
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2024/08/30
date added: 2024/08/31
shelves: argosy-book-group
review:
Review comin'
]]> <![CDATA[Father Joe: The Man Who Saved My Soul]]> 143685
Like everything human, it started with sex. In 1955, fourteen-year-old Tony found himself entangled with a married Catholic woman. In Cold War England, where Catholicism was the subject of news stories and Graham Greene bestsellers, Tony was whisked off by the woman’s husband to see a priest and be saved.

Yet what he found was a far cry from the priests he’d known at Catholic school, where boys were beaten with belts or set upon by dogs. Instead, he met Father Joe, a gentle, stammering, ungainly Benedictine who never used the words “wrong� or “guilt,� who believed that God was in everyone and that “the only sin was selfishness.� During the next forty years, as his life and career drastically ebbed and flowed, Tony discovered that his visits to Father Joe remained the one constant in his life—the relationship that, in the most serious sense, saved it.

From the fifties and his adolescent desire to join an abbey himself; to the sixties, when attending Cambridge and seeing the satire of Beyond the Fringe convinced him to change the world with laughter, not prayer; to the seventies and successful stints as an original editor of National Lampoon and a writer of Lemmings , the off-Broadway smash that introduced John Belushi and Chevy Chase; to professional disaster after co-creating the legendary English series Spitting Image ; from drinking to drugs, from a failed first marriage to a successful second and the miracle of parenthood—the years only deepened Tony’s need for the wisdom of his other and more real father, creating a bond that could not be broken, even by death.

A startling departure for this acclaimed satirist, Father Joe is a sincere account of how Tony Hendra learned to love. It’s the story of a whole generation looking for a way back from mockery and irony, looking for its own Father Joe, and a testament to one of the most charismatic mentors in modern literature.]]> 304 Tony Hendra 0812972341 Jeri 4 pleasure-read
I didn't know a thing about Hendra. All I knew was what I read on the book's inside flap. A British writer. A satirist. The guy helped create the National Lampoon, played the band manager in "This Is Spinal Tap" and worked with comedians who became household names in the 1970s. You know, Belushi and Chase and Carlin.

When I dove into his book, Hendra unveils in unflinching detail how he lived –� fast and loose in a fog of drugs and alcohol. After I finished "Father Joe," I wanted to find out more about him, and I read that Hendra was accused of sexually molesting a daughter from his first marriage. That damning revelation came out in NY Times right after the publication in 2004 of "Father Joe" when it became a bestseller. Hendra's daughter claimed that her dad didn't tell everything.

When the story ran, the NYTimes ombudsman at the time wrote: "I can't imagine an accusation more serious, a transgression more detestable. If her story is true, Tony Hendra deserves punishment far greater than humiliation in the pages of The Times. As an editor, the verities of the profession might have led me to publish this article. But as a reader, I wish The Times hadn't."

If I knew that, would I have picked up "Father Joe"? Maybe. But I would have missed reading a memoir that really moved me. When I finished "Father Joe" on an early Saturday morning and closed it, I said to myself "What a beautiful book."

Hendra's book is all about his 40-year friendship with a Benedictine monk named Father Joe, and it illustrates how a relationship between two people who are decades apart in age can heal. But what really grabbed me was the writing. Man, Hendra can write. Here's his opening sentence:

"How I met Father Joe. I was 14 and having an affair with a married woman."

And then Hendra is off, galloping through the pages and giving us a glimpse of his childhood, his career, and his many missteps. Some are funny; some are not. By page 270, Hendra ends his memoir with this:

"In the end his knowledge came from his bottomless supply of love, a poor, bedraggled, overburdened old word, but in Father Joe's hands, revitalized. For Joe, love was a cure, an emollient, a diagnostic tool, a stimulus, a reward, a nutrient, a guarantor of health and peace. He was the living breathing proof that love will teach you everything you really need to know, even if you choose to live outside the world and its supposedly limitless stocks of knowledge and information.

Father Joe was the human incarnation of Blake's vision: You can find eternity in a grain of sand."

Father Joe died in 1998. He was in his 90s; he had cancer. His death prompted Hendra to write the book. Hendra died in 2021 of ALS, a death sentence of a disease. He was 79.

As for his daughter's allegations, Hendra responded with this: "I can only just categorically deny this. It's not a new allegation. It's simply not true, I'm afraid."

A classic he said/she said. As a former journalist who worked in daily newspapers for nearly three decades, I have seen my share of those back-and-forth dispatches. I've written them, too. They are always damning every way you look at it. Hendra's is no exception. As for his memoir, "Father Joe," I come away from it with a feeling of why I read in the first place. You get a glimpse of someone's life or a particular time in history. But if you're lucky enough, you come away with what can help you in your own life. And the lesson here? Friendships matter.

"Father Joe" reminds me of that great quote from the French writer Marcel Proust: “Let us be grateful to people who make us happy, they are the charming gardeners who make our souls blossom.�

True. Despite his daughter's allegations -- and whether if it's true or not –� Hendra gave us all a gift with "Father Joe." It's a necessary reminder of our humanity, of why we live.]]> 3.74 2004 Father Joe: The Man Who Saved My Soul
author: Tony Hendra
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.74
book published: 2004
rating: 4
read at: 2024/08/10
date added: 2024/08/11
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
I can't remember how I found out about this book. I think it was referenced in Andrew McCarthy's memoir, "Brat: An '80s Story," and when I saw our library had it on the shelves, I thought why not. And it was the quite the surprise.

I didn't know a thing about Hendra. All I knew was what I read on the book's inside flap. A British writer. A satirist. The guy helped create the National Lampoon, played the band manager in "This Is Spinal Tap" and worked with comedians who became household names in the 1970s. You know, Belushi and Chase and Carlin.

When I dove into his book, Hendra unveils in unflinching detail how he lived –� fast and loose in a fog of drugs and alcohol. After I finished "Father Joe," I wanted to find out more about him, and I read that Hendra was accused of sexually molesting a daughter from his first marriage. That damning revelation came out in NY Times right after the publication in 2004 of "Father Joe" when it became a bestseller. Hendra's daughter claimed that her dad didn't tell everything.

When the story ran, the NYTimes ombudsman at the time wrote: "I can't imagine an accusation more serious, a transgression more detestable. If her story is true, Tony Hendra deserves punishment far greater than humiliation in the pages of The Times. As an editor, the verities of the profession might have led me to publish this article. But as a reader, I wish The Times hadn't."

If I knew that, would I have picked up "Father Joe"? Maybe. But I would have missed reading a memoir that really moved me. When I finished "Father Joe" on an early Saturday morning and closed it, I said to myself "What a beautiful book."

Hendra's book is all about his 40-year friendship with a Benedictine monk named Father Joe, and it illustrates how a relationship between two people who are decades apart in age can heal. But what really grabbed me was the writing. Man, Hendra can write. Here's his opening sentence:

"How I met Father Joe. I was 14 and having an affair with a married woman."

And then Hendra is off, galloping through the pages and giving us a glimpse of his childhood, his career, and his many missteps. Some are funny; some are not. By page 270, Hendra ends his memoir with this:

"In the end his knowledge came from his bottomless supply of love, a poor, bedraggled, overburdened old word, but in Father Joe's hands, revitalized. For Joe, love was a cure, an emollient, a diagnostic tool, a stimulus, a reward, a nutrient, a guarantor of health and peace. He was the living breathing proof that love will teach you everything you really need to know, even if you choose to live outside the world and its supposedly limitless stocks of knowledge and information.

Father Joe was the human incarnation of Blake's vision: You can find eternity in a grain of sand."

Father Joe died in 1998. He was in his 90s; he had cancer. His death prompted Hendra to write the book. Hendra died in 2021 of ALS, a death sentence of a disease. He was 79.

As for his daughter's allegations, Hendra responded with this: "I can only just categorically deny this. It's not a new allegation. It's simply not true, I'm afraid."

A classic he said/she said. As a former journalist who worked in daily newspapers for nearly three decades, I have seen my share of those back-and-forth dispatches. I've written them, too. They are always damning every way you look at it. Hendra's is no exception. As for his memoir, "Father Joe," I come away from it with a feeling of why I read in the first place. You get a glimpse of someone's life or a particular time in history. But if you're lucky enough, you come away with what can help you in your own life. And the lesson here? Friendships matter.

"Father Joe" reminds me of that great quote from the French writer Marcel Proust: “Let us be grateful to people who make us happy, they are the charming gardeners who make our souls blossom.�

True. Despite his daughter's allegations -- and whether if it's true or not –� Hendra gave us all a gift with "Father Joe." It's a necessary reminder of our humanity, of why we live.
]]> <![CDATA[Excellent Sheep: The Miseducation of the American Elite and the Way to a Meaningful Life]]> 18775383
Excellent Sheep takes a sharp look at the high-pressure conveyor belt that begins with parents and counselors who demand perfect grades and culminates in the skewed applications Deresiewicz saw firsthand as a member of Yale’s admissions committee. As schools shift focus from the humanities to "practical" subjects like economics and computer science, students are losing the ability to think in innovative ways. Deresiewicz explains how college should be a time for self-discovery, when students can establish their own values and measures of success, so they can forge their own path. He addresses parents, students, educators, and anyone who's interested in the direction of American society, featuring quotes from real students and graduates he has corresponded with over the years, candidly exposing where the system is broken and clearly presenting solutions.]]> 245 William Deresiewicz 1476702713 Jeri 3
William Deresiewicz, a former Yale professor, gives you many stats and stories that make you think. But it's when he wields his pixel pen like a sharp-tongued editorial writer that gets your attention. Like this:

"I taught many wonderful young people during my years in the Ivy League � bright, thoughtful, creative kids whom it was a pleasure to talk with and learn from. But most of them seemed content to color within the lines that their education had marked out for them. Very few were passionate about ideas. Very few saw college as a part of a larger project of intellectual discovery and development, one that they directed by themselves and for themselves."

Or this:

"Teaching, Socrates said, is the reeducation of desire. If that sounds paternalistic, it is. Professors should be mentors, not commodities or clerks. Education is something you consume, it’s an experience that you have to give yourself over to. But colleges don’t think like that anymore. They see themselves as supplying a market, not guarding a public trust.�

And especially this:

"Anyone who tells you that the sole purpose of education is the acquisition of negotiable skills is attempting to reduce you to a productive employee at work, a gullible consumer in the market, and a docile subject of the state. What’s at stake, when we ask what college is for, is nothing less than our ability to remain fully human. A real education sends you into the world bearing questions, not resumes.�

So, you get the idea. Deresiewicz does ramble. And his suggestions of changing the admission policies to convincing states to invest more in public education seems like a fruitless windmill fight. Still, the book gets you thinking about what you see -- and who you see -- on every college campus.]]> 3.85 2014 Excellent Sheep: The Miseducation of the American Elite and the Way to a Meaningful Life
author: William Deresiewicz
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.85
book published: 2014
rating: 3
read at: 2016/08/03
date added: 2024/08/11
shelves:
review:
On the college campus where I work, I've heard professors mention this book in hushed tones. As in, "Read this book." So, I did. I liked it. It felt like one long magazine piece, but as a journalist, there is nothing wrong with that. There is much to chew on here, whether you're a college student, a parent of a college student or someone simply interested in higher education.

William Deresiewicz, a former Yale professor, gives you many stats and stories that make you think. But it's when he wields his pixel pen like a sharp-tongued editorial writer that gets your attention. Like this:

"I taught many wonderful young people during my years in the Ivy League � bright, thoughtful, creative kids whom it was a pleasure to talk with and learn from. But most of them seemed content to color within the lines that their education had marked out for them. Very few were passionate about ideas. Very few saw college as a part of a larger project of intellectual discovery and development, one that they directed by themselves and for themselves."

Or this:

"Teaching, Socrates said, is the reeducation of desire. If that sounds paternalistic, it is. Professors should be mentors, not commodities or clerks. Education is something you consume, it’s an experience that you have to give yourself over to. But colleges don’t think like that anymore. They see themselves as supplying a market, not guarding a public trust.�

And especially this:

"Anyone who tells you that the sole purpose of education is the acquisition of negotiable skills is attempting to reduce you to a productive employee at work, a gullible consumer in the market, and a docile subject of the state. What’s at stake, when we ask what college is for, is nothing less than our ability to remain fully human. A real education sends you into the world bearing questions, not resumes.�

So, you get the idea. Deresiewicz does ramble. And his suggestions of changing the admission policies to convincing states to invest more in public education seems like a fruitless windmill fight. Still, the book gets you thinking about what you see -- and who you see -- on every college campus.
]]> <![CDATA[Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End]]> 20696006 In Being Mortal, author Atul Gawande tackles the hardest challenge of his profession: how medicine can not only improve life but also the process of its ending

Medicine has triumphed in modern times, transforming birth, injury, and infectious disease from harrowing to manageable. But in the inevitable condition of aging and death, the goals of medicine seem too frequently to run counter to the interest of the human spirit. Nursing homes, preoccupied with safety, pin patients into railed beds and wheelchairs. Hospitals isolate the dying, checking for vital signs long after the goals of cure have become moot. Doctors, committed to extending life, continue to carry out devastating procedures that in the end extend suffering.

Gawande, a practicing surgeon, addresses his profession's ultimate limitation, arguing that quality of life is the desired goal for patients and families. Gawande offers examples of freer, more socially fulfilling models for assisting the infirm and dependent elderly, and he explores the varieties of hospice care to demonstrate that a person's last weeks or months may be rich and dignified.]]> 282 Atul Gawande 0805095152 Jeri 4 pleasure-read
Now, Rob is some kind of astute reader. He's a CFO of a local marketing company, a guy who loves numbers and keeps top-shelf whiskey in his office. When he reads a book he likes from our book-club crew, he'll read the author's past works just to get a feel of what they're like before we gather. That's right, before. So, when he mentioned Atul Gawande's "Being Mortal," I picked it up from our local library.

Immediately, I was reminded why I didn't read it when it first came out. "Being Mortal" was released in 2014, the same year my mom died. Her health declined slowly over a five-year period, and I was not in the headspace to read "Being Mortal" when it caught everyone's interest.

But time has a way to soften grief a bit. So, after Rob's comment and hearing Gawande on Krista Tippett's podcast "On Being," I dove in.

It's quite the emotional read because of the stories Gawande brings up. When Gawande wrote "Being Mortal," he was a endocrine surgeon and a professor at Harvard Medical School. The stories he raises in "Being Mortal" come from the 200 patients he interviewed for his book. Through story, Gawande showed how death -- and how it's treated here in the United States -- affects patients as well as their families and friends. Just everything.

So, "Being Mortal" is a tough read. But it's such an important read. It tells the back story of how assisted living communities, nursing homes and palliative care came to be as well as why more people today die in hospitals rather than their homes.

That's the nuts-and-bolts, give-me-the-facts side of the book's importance. The more impactful side, though, is what "Being Mortal" offers all of us. It can provide some solace as we face our final years, final decades on this earth.

We're all living longer and trying to live longer, and we –� or someone we love –� will face death at some point in our lives.. In "Being Mortal," Gawande gives us an emotional blueprint of how we can face our last days in the best way possible and how others we love can do the same. He does that through story. That includes the story about the death of his father.

In the book's epilogue, Gawande writes:

"We've been wrong about what our job is in medicine. We think our job is to ensure health and survival. But really it is larger than that. It is to enable well-being. And well-being is about the reasons one wishes to be alive. Those reasons matter not just at the end of life, or when debility comes, but all along the way. Whenever serious sickness or injury strikes and your body or ind breaks down, the vital questions are the same:

-- What is your understanding of the situation and its potential outcomes?
-- What are your fears and what are your hopes?
-- What are the trade-offs you are willing to make and not willing to make?
-- And what is the course of action that best serves this understanding?

A few paragraphs later, Gawande adds:

"If to be human is to be limited, then the role of caring professions and institutions -- from surgeons to nursing homes -- ought to be aiding people in their struggle with those limits. Sometimes, we can offer a cure, sometimes only a salve, sometimes not even that. But whatever we can offer, our interventions, and the risks and sacrifices they entail, are justified only if they serve the larger aims of a person's life. When we forget that, the suffering we inflict can be barbaric. When we remember it, the good we do can be breathtaking."

In 2022, Gawande became the assistant administrator for global health at USAID. His book, "Being Mortal," issues a clarion call of how all of us need to rethink how we view our final days as well as the final days of those we love.

Rob has. And now, I have too.]]> 4.47 2014 Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End
author: Atul Gawande
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.47
book published: 2014
rating: 4
read at: 2024/07/22
date added: 2024/07/24
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
My friend Rob and I have been in a book club together for nearly 20 years, and we've read all kinds of stuff together. A few weeks ago, he called and told me he had to step away from our book-club crew for a few months because he had to concentrate on taking care of his ailing mother. Then, he asked, "Hey, have you read 'Being Mortal'?" When I told him I hadn't, he responded, "Jeri, that book changed my life. It gave me the insight I needed to know what I need to do for my mom."

Now, Rob is some kind of astute reader. He's a CFO of a local marketing company, a guy who loves numbers and keeps top-shelf whiskey in his office. When he reads a book he likes from our book-club crew, he'll read the author's past works just to get a feel of what they're like before we gather. That's right, before. So, when he mentioned Atul Gawande's "Being Mortal," I picked it up from our local library.

Immediately, I was reminded why I didn't read it when it first came out. "Being Mortal" was released in 2014, the same year my mom died. Her health declined slowly over a five-year period, and I was not in the headspace to read "Being Mortal" when it caught everyone's interest.

But time has a way to soften grief a bit. So, after Rob's comment and hearing Gawande on Krista Tippett's podcast "On Being," I dove in.

It's quite the emotional read because of the stories Gawande brings up. When Gawande wrote "Being Mortal," he was a endocrine surgeon and a professor at Harvard Medical School. The stories he raises in "Being Mortal" come from the 200 patients he interviewed for his book. Through story, Gawande showed how death -- and how it's treated here in the United States -- affects patients as well as their families and friends. Just everything.

So, "Being Mortal" is a tough read. But it's such an important read. It tells the back story of how assisted living communities, nursing homes and palliative care came to be as well as why more people today die in hospitals rather than their homes.

That's the nuts-and-bolts, give-me-the-facts side of the book's importance. The more impactful side, though, is what "Being Mortal" offers all of us. It can provide some solace as we face our final years, final decades on this earth.

We're all living longer and trying to live longer, and we –� or someone we love –� will face death at some point in our lives.. In "Being Mortal," Gawande gives us an emotional blueprint of how we can face our last days in the best way possible and how others we love can do the same. He does that through story. That includes the story about the death of his father.

In the book's epilogue, Gawande writes:

"We've been wrong about what our job is in medicine. We think our job is to ensure health and survival. But really it is larger than that. It is to enable well-being. And well-being is about the reasons one wishes to be alive. Those reasons matter not just at the end of life, or when debility comes, but all along the way. Whenever serious sickness or injury strikes and your body or ind breaks down, the vital questions are the same:

-- What is your understanding of the situation and its potential outcomes?
-- What are your fears and what are your hopes?
-- What are the trade-offs you are willing to make and not willing to make?
-- And what is the course of action that best serves this understanding?

A few paragraphs later, Gawande adds:

"If to be human is to be limited, then the role of caring professions and institutions -- from surgeons to nursing homes -- ought to be aiding people in their struggle with those limits. Sometimes, we can offer a cure, sometimes only a salve, sometimes not even that. But whatever we can offer, our interventions, and the risks and sacrifices they entail, are justified only if they serve the larger aims of a person's life. When we forget that, the suffering we inflict can be barbaric. When we remember it, the good we do can be breathtaking."

In 2022, Gawande became the assistant administrator for global health at USAID. His book, "Being Mortal," issues a clarion call of how all of us need to rethink how we view our final days as well as the final days of those we love.

Rob has. And now, I have too.
]]> Brat: An '80s Story 55277901 Pretty in Pink, St. Elmo's Fire, Weekend at Bernie's, and Less than Zero, and as a charter member of Hollywood's Brat Pack. That iconic group of ingenues and heartthrobs included Rob Lowe, Molly Ringwald, Emilio Estevez, and Demi Moore, and has come to represent both a genre of film and an era of pop culture.

In his memoir Brat: An '80s Story, McCarthy focuses his gaze on that singular moment in time. The result is a revealing look at coming of age in a maelstrom, reckoning with conflicted ambition, innocence, addiction, and masculinity. New York City of the 1980s is brought to vivid life in these pages, from scoring loose joints in Washington Square Park to skipping school in favor of the dark revival houses of the Village where he fell in love with the movies that would change his life.Filled with personal revelations of innocence lost to heady days in Hollywood with John Hughes and an iconic cast of characters, Brat is a surprising and intimate story of an outsider caught up in a most unwitting success.]]> 223 Andrew McCarthy 1538754274 Jeri 4 pleasure-read
It's a quick read, and like any memoir, Andrew McCarthy writes in a chronological fashion of how his acting life started and how his life became an emotional rollercoaster fueled by alcohol. He's quite open about how his alcohol affected his life and presents a wars-and-all look at a point when he was part of the 1980s zeitgeist with such films as "Pretty in Pink," "St. Elmo's Fire," and "Less Than Zero."

What struck me is how much luck was involved in his rise. He went from a student struggling at NYU, a teenager who felt he was too scrawny, and landed a plum part in "Class," his first film. He stumbled forward through the rest of his acting life into roles that got him on billboards, theater marquees, and posters.

McCarthy essentially caught lightning in a bottle -- and he grabbed a fistful. But here's where the book really grabbed me.

McCarthy can write. He also wasn't afraid to write about his own stumbles. He didn't make excuses. He wrote candidly about his own misgivings, his dysfunctional family and how his own failures both professionally and personally led him to where he is today. And on every scene from his 216-page book, I can so understand how he feels.

See, McCarthy and I are the same age. When I was a senior at the University of South Carolina, I had the movie poster "Pretty in Pink" on my campus apartment wall right above my couch. There it was, McCarthy, Jon Cryer and Molly Ringwald staring at me as soon as I walked through the door of the place I called the "Bird's Nest."

I got the poster from the college radio station where I once DJed for two years. It's not because I loved the movie. I loved its music, for sure. But I liked the film because it was a snapshot of my generation, something I rarely saw.

By this time, I had seen "St. Elmo's Fire" in the theater when it came out in the summer of 1985. I was interning for USA TODAY in central Florida, working at a weekly newspaper. I felt so alone along the Florida Space Coast. I lived alone. I was an eight-hour drive from home, away from everything that was familiar to me. So, all I did was work, go for long runs along the Indian River after work, bike to the beach, read "Less Than Zero" and "Delcorso's Gallery," and listen to my own mix tapes that contained tunes by Howard Jones, REM, The Smiths, Joe Jackson, The Pretenders, and the Psychedelic Furs on my boom box in my room.

That summer is a blur. But one thing I'll always remember was this:

After I saw "St. Elmo's Fire," I sat on the hood of my car in the theater parking lot. I sucked down a few beers and talked to a girl from the newsroom who was my age. We had just met, and we talked about what the movie meant and what we hoped our future would look like. The movie wasn't all that great. But its sensibility of young adults searching for who they were resonated with me. I was them; they were me. I was the moody writer wondering where I fit in my new world of newspapers. I was McCarthy -- or at least his character, except without the cigarettes But after reading "Brat: An '80s Story," I realized he was my doppelgänger. I was him; he was me.

In my 20s, I drank too much and wrestled with anxiety, feeling like an imposter as I charged headlong into journalism trying to find my way. I did. I stayed in daily journalism for nearly 30 years. Today, I'm a married father of two and writing still pays my bills and stokes my creativity. As I read "Brat: An '80s Story," I time-traveled back to my 20s and every one of my senses vibrated. In my mind, I catapulted myself back to a time when I was the college journalist, the college radio DJ who saw alcohol as a necessary crux to deal with life, fuel the party, and mask the insecurities I felt for the future.

Just like McCarthy.

So, I gave "Brat: An '80s Story" gave four stars. It's subjective, of course. But like what all good books do, whether fiction or nonfiction, "Brat: An '80s Story" helped me understand once again my own past and how McCarthy -- or what he represented –� fit into it.

So many sentences hit home. But here's one. From page 209. McCarthy wrote:

"... in a great many ways acting saved my life. When I stepped onstage as the Artful Dodger all those years ago, I light went on inside me that has never gone out. I came close to extinguishing it through alcohol, but my subsequent recovery, like a crucible, has only changed its form and added another hue to its flame. And yet, among a certain generation of people, the work I did as a young man will forever burn brightest. And it's not just the work: maybe now, more importantly, it's the memory of the work that's so valuable to people. Because in the memory of those movies exists a touchstone of youth, of when life was all ahead, when the future was a blank slate, when anything was possible."

Yes, to that.]]> 3.57 2021 Brat: An '80s Story
author: Andrew McCarthy
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.57
book published: 2021
rating: 4
read at: 2024/07/04
date added: 2024/07/10
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
After my wife Katherine and I watched the film, "Brat," she ordered the book. I was glad of that because I had requested the book at our local library years ago and stayed on the waiting list for months -- only to never get it. So, after she finished it –� she liked it � I got started.

It's a quick read, and like any memoir, Andrew McCarthy writes in a chronological fashion of how his acting life started and how his life became an emotional rollercoaster fueled by alcohol. He's quite open about how his alcohol affected his life and presents a wars-and-all look at a point when he was part of the 1980s zeitgeist with such films as "Pretty in Pink," "St. Elmo's Fire," and "Less Than Zero."

What struck me is how much luck was involved in his rise. He went from a student struggling at NYU, a teenager who felt he was too scrawny, and landed a plum part in "Class," his first film. He stumbled forward through the rest of his acting life into roles that got him on billboards, theater marquees, and posters.

McCarthy essentially caught lightning in a bottle -- and he grabbed a fistful. But here's where the book really grabbed me.

McCarthy can write. He also wasn't afraid to write about his own stumbles. He didn't make excuses. He wrote candidly about his own misgivings, his dysfunctional family and how his own failures both professionally and personally led him to where he is today. And on every scene from his 216-page book, I can so understand how he feels.

See, McCarthy and I are the same age. When I was a senior at the University of South Carolina, I had the movie poster "Pretty in Pink" on my campus apartment wall right above my couch. There it was, McCarthy, Jon Cryer and Molly Ringwald staring at me as soon as I walked through the door of the place I called the "Bird's Nest."

I got the poster from the college radio station where I once DJed for two years. It's not because I loved the movie. I loved its music, for sure. But I liked the film because it was a snapshot of my generation, something I rarely saw.

By this time, I had seen "St. Elmo's Fire" in the theater when it came out in the summer of 1985. I was interning for USA TODAY in central Florida, working at a weekly newspaper. I felt so alone along the Florida Space Coast. I lived alone. I was an eight-hour drive from home, away from everything that was familiar to me. So, all I did was work, go for long runs along the Indian River after work, bike to the beach, read "Less Than Zero" and "Delcorso's Gallery," and listen to my own mix tapes that contained tunes by Howard Jones, REM, The Smiths, Joe Jackson, The Pretenders, and the Psychedelic Furs on my boom box in my room.

That summer is a blur. But one thing I'll always remember was this:

After I saw "St. Elmo's Fire," I sat on the hood of my car in the theater parking lot. I sucked down a few beers and talked to a girl from the newsroom who was my age. We had just met, and we talked about what the movie meant and what we hoped our future would look like. The movie wasn't all that great. But its sensibility of young adults searching for who they were resonated with me. I was them; they were me. I was the moody writer wondering where I fit in my new world of newspapers. I was McCarthy -- or at least his character, except without the cigarettes But after reading "Brat: An '80s Story," I realized he was my doppelgänger. I was him; he was me.

In my 20s, I drank too much and wrestled with anxiety, feeling like an imposter as I charged headlong into journalism trying to find my way. I did. I stayed in daily journalism for nearly 30 years. Today, I'm a married father of two and writing still pays my bills and stokes my creativity. As I read "Brat: An '80s Story," I time-traveled back to my 20s and every one of my senses vibrated. In my mind, I catapulted myself back to a time when I was the college journalist, the college radio DJ who saw alcohol as a necessary crux to deal with life, fuel the party, and mask the insecurities I felt for the future.

Just like McCarthy.

So, I gave "Brat: An '80s Story" gave four stars. It's subjective, of course. But like what all good books do, whether fiction or nonfiction, "Brat: An '80s Story" helped me understand once again my own past and how McCarthy -- or what he represented –� fit into it.

So many sentences hit home. But here's one. From page 209. McCarthy wrote:

"... in a great many ways acting saved my life. When I stepped onstage as the Artful Dodger all those years ago, I light went on inside me that has never gone out. I came close to extinguishing it through alcohol, but my subsequent recovery, like a crucible, has only changed its form and added another hue to its flame. And yet, among a certain generation of people, the work I did as a young man will forever burn brightest. And it's not just the work: maybe now, more importantly, it's the memory of the work that's so valuable to people. Because in the memory of those movies exists a touchstone of youth, of when life was all ahead, when the future was a blank slate, when anything was possible."

Yes, to that.
]]> Erasure 355862 We's Lives in Da Ghetto, the exploitative debut novel of a young, middle-class black woman who once visited "some relatives in Harlem for a couple of days." Hailed as an authentic representation of the African American experience, the book is a national bestseller and its author feted on the Kenya Dunston television show. The book's success rankles all the more as Monk's own most recent novel has just notched its seventh rejection.

Even as his career as a writer appears to have stalled, Monk finds himself coping with changes in his personal life. In need of distraction from old memories, new responsibilities, and his professional stagnation, Monk composes, in a heat of inspiration and energy, a fierce parody of the sort of exploitative, ghetto wanna-be lit represented by We's Lives in Da Ghetto.

But when his agent sends this literary indictment (included here in its entirety) out to publishers, it is greeted as an authentic new voice of black America. Monk -- or his pseudonymous alter ego, Stagg R. Leigh -- is offered money, fame, success beyond anything he has known. And as demand begins to build for meetings with and appearances by Leigh, Monk is faced with a whole new set of problems.]]> 280 Percival Everett 0786888156 Jeri 3 argosy-book-group Review TK 4.17 2001 Erasure
author: Percival Everett
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.17
book published: 2001
rating: 3
read at: 2024/06/26
date added: 2024/06/28
shelves: argosy-book-group
review:
Review TK
]]> <![CDATA[My Home Team: A Sportswriter's Life and the Redemptive Power of Small-Town Girls Basketball]]> 75593815 In this poignant memoir, a legendary sports journalist writes about the team that changed his the Morton High School Lady Potters basketball team.

Dave Kindred has covered dozens of Super Bowls and written about stars like Muhammad Ali, Tiger Woods, and Michael Jordan. But a high-school girls basketball team—the Lady Potters of Morton, Illinois—stands apart from the rest.

In this moving and intimate story, Kindred writes about his rise to professional success and the changes that brought him back to his hometown late in life. As he dealt with personal hardship, his urge to write sustained him. For years, he has recapped the games of the Lady Potters, including their many runs to state championships. He attended game after game, sitting in the stands and making notes, paid nothing but Milk Duds. And the team and their community were there for him as he lost a grandson to addiction and his wife to long-term illness.

Tender and honest, Kindred’s story reminds readers what sports are really about. He trades in the exhausting spectacle of Super Bowl Sunday for the joy of togetherness, the fire of competition, and the inexhaustible hope for victory tomorrow.]]> 305 Dave Kindred 1541702220 Jeri 5 pleasure-read
I got a box in the mail months ago, opened it, and I saw it was a gift from Ted, my forever friend a few of us call "Sweet Daddy Pop." We grew up together and got arrested together for doing lame-brained moves as teenagers. He was one of my groomsmen, I was one of his, and we have continued our friendship with our other forever friend, Scott, our other groomsmen, by hitting some music festivals somewhere every year. Anyway, Ted sent me a copy of "My Home Team" after he and his wife Robin read it. Taped to the inside was this message from Ted: "This book has you written all over it. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did. From SDP."

Sweet Daddy Pop was right.

Dave Kindred is a legendary sports columnist who has won his share of big-time awards for writing about Super Bowls, the World Olympics, World Series games, the Masters' golf tournament and Muhammad Ali, the heavyweight champion. Ali called him "Louisville." Dave had penned columns for The Washington Post, the Atlanta Journal Constitution, National Sports Daily, Sporting News, Golf Digest and ... let me take a breath ... the Louisville Courier Journal.

This book is about all that. But really, "My Home Team" is about his latest beat. With pen in hand, paid with a box of Milk Duds every game, he wrote about the Lady Potters at Morton High. They were a basketball dynasty in Illinois. Dave called them, "The Golden State Warriors with ponytails," a phrase that ended up on the back of T-shirts.

Dave had retired from journalism and moved back to where he grew up in the dot-sized town of Atlanta, Illinois. There, he realized he wanted to be a reporter. And there, he also fell in love. He married his high school sweetheart,Cheryl Ann Liesman. They got married, had a son, got a passport through big-city journalism to see the world and retired to a farm. Dave couldn't put down the pend and notepad. He and Cheryl went to see the Lady Potters play, and Dave decided he wanted to write about their team in the way any columnist does -- with personality, verve, humor and the gift of turning a phrase.

Of course, Dave Kindred can write. And it's fun to hear about his stories about Ali and a newspaper world that really doesn't exist anymore. But where Dave's book goes from a fun read to an impactful read is when Cheryl suffers a stroke and the Lady Potters become not just an avocation, but a light in a life shrouded in the darkness of grief.

Dave writes:

"A couple of years in, maybe three or four even, I understood my real reason for writing about the Lady Potters. They kept me alive. Not in the sense of giving me a reason to live. But they made it possible for me to believe I existed. People I loved were gone. The newspaper work I loved was gone. I refused to be gone, to be disappeared.

"I wrote golf for Golf Digest, I wrote a dual biography on Ali and Cosell, and I was deep into a book on the Washington Post. I refused to go gentle into that good night. Damned right, I would write about girls basketball.

"It was fun, and grandmas stayed up late to read that stuff, and a buddy with a master's degree in education said, "Man, are you ever helping these young ladies lay foundations of high self-esteem that are so going to be important. I'm in awe." All good. Not my purpose, but good. My purpose was unbecoming. The writing was proof I existed. "

In June 2021, four months after their 59th wedding anniversary, Cheryl died. In his acknowledgements, Dave writes: "I am a reporter trying to write better than I can. I needed help on this one. I leaned on a woman I met outside Mrs. Brak's English class when we were seventeen. She is beside me now. I love you, Sherri."

A few pages in, you see Dave's dedication: "For Cheryl, forever and a day."

The morning I finished this book, I sent a text to Ted: "Finished. And dammit, Ted, I effin' cried when I closed "My Home Team' this morning. In his acknowledgements, Kindred writes: "I am a reporter trying to write better than I can." Man, I so get that. Ted, Sweet Daddy Pop, thank u for this gift."

Ted responded: "There was clearly a reason I thought of you when i read it. Robin did too."

Like Dave Kindred, I'm a journalist, a columnist. I've watched my own newspaper world crumble. After 28 years as a daily journalist, I knew I had to leave. I had two kids to put through college, and I found job security and better pay in higher education. Today, I write about one of fastest growing universities in the country. But like Dave Kindred, I also write about what moves me. In the fall of 2017, I started a blog after writing about my son's high school football team for two years. Just like Dave Kindred.

Writers write. We write to breathe. In Dave's case, he wrote and found out that these teenage girls, these Golden State Warriors in pigtails, stopped him from stumbling into a dark well of despair. They were his light, and they became an example of what writing can do.

It can heal, and that is a mighty powerful thing.
]]> 4.15 My Home Team: A Sportswriter's Life and the Redemptive Power of Small-Town Girls Basketball
author: Dave Kindred
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.15
book published:
rating: 5
read at: 2024/06/09
date added: 2024/06/10
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
Dave Kindred's "My Home Team" came to me out of the blue.

I got a box in the mail months ago, opened it, and I saw it was a gift from Ted, my forever friend a few of us call "Sweet Daddy Pop." We grew up together and got arrested together for doing lame-brained moves as teenagers. He was one of my groomsmen, I was one of his, and we have continued our friendship with our other forever friend, Scott, our other groomsmen, by hitting some music festivals somewhere every year. Anyway, Ted sent me a copy of "My Home Team" after he and his wife Robin read it. Taped to the inside was this message from Ted: "This book has you written all over it. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did. From SDP."

Sweet Daddy Pop was right.

Dave Kindred is a legendary sports columnist who has won his share of big-time awards for writing about Super Bowls, the World Olympics, World Series games, the Masters' golf tournament and Muhammad Ali, the heavyweight champion. Ali called him "Louisville." Dave had penned columns for The Washington Post, the Atlanta Journal Constitution, National Sports Daily, Sporting News, Golf Digest and ... let me take a breath ... the Louisville Courier Journal.

This book is about all that. But really, "My Home Team" is about his latest beat. With pen in hand, paid with a box of Milk Duds every game, he wrote about the Lady Potters at Morton High. They were a basketball dynasty in Illinois. Dave called them, "The Golden State Warriors with ponytails," a phrase that ended up on the back of T-shirts.

Dave had retired from journalism and moved back to where he grew up in the dot-sized town of Atlanta, Illinois. There, he realized he wanted to be a reporter. And there, he also fell in love. He married his high school sweetheart,Cheryl Ann Liesman. They got married, had a son, got a passport through big-city journalism to see the world and retired to a farm. Dave couldn't put down the pend and notepad. He and Cheryl went to see the Lady Potters play, and Dave decided he wanted to write about their team in the way any columnist does -- with personality, verve, humor and the gift of turning a phrase.

Of course, Dave Kindred can write. And it's fun to hear about his stories about Ali and a newspaper world that really doesn't exist anymore. But where Dave's book goes from a fun read to an impactful read is when Cheryl suffers a stroke and the Lady Potters become not just an avocation, but a light in a life shrouded in the darkness of grief.

Dave writes:

"A couple of years in, maybe three or four even, I understood my real reason for writing about the Lady Potters. They kept me alive. Not in the sense of giving me a reason to live. But they made it possible for me to believe I existed. People I loved were gone. The newspaper work I loved was gone. I refused to be gone, to be disappeared.

"I wrote golf for Golf Digest, I wrote a dual biography on Ali and Cosell, and I was deep into a book on the Washington Post. I refused to go gentle into that good night. Damned right, I would write about girls basketball.

"It was fun, and grandmas stayed up late to read that stuff, and a buddy with a master's degree in education said, "Man, are you ever helping these young ladies lay foundations of high self-esteem that are so going to be important. I'm in awe." All good. Not my purpose, but good. My purpose was unbecoming. The writing was proof I existed. "

In June 2021, four months after their 59th wedding anniversary, Cheryl died. In his acknowledgements, Dave writes: "I am a reporter trying to write better than I can. I needed help on this one. I leaned on a woman I met outside Mrs. Brak's English class when we were seventeen. She is beside me now. I love you, Sherri."

A few pages in, you see Dave's dedication: "For Cheryl, forever and a day."

The morning I finished this book, I sent a text to Ted: "Finished. And dammit, Ted, I effin' cried when I closed "My Home Team' this morning. In his acknowledgements, Kindred writes: "I am a reporter trying to write better than I can." Man, I so get that. Ted, Sweet Daddy Pop, thank u for this gift."

Ted responded: "There was clearly a reason I thought of you when i read it. Robin did too."

Like Dave Kindred, I'm a journalist, a columnist. I've watched my own newspaper world crumble. After 28 years as a daily journalist, I knew I had to leave. I had two kids to put through college, and I found job security and better pay in higher education. Today, I write about one of fastest growing universities in the country. But like Dave Kindred, I also write about what moves me. In the fall of 2017, I started a blog after writing about my son's high school football team for two years. Just like Dave Kindred.

Writers write. We write to breathe. In Dave's case, he wrote and found out that these teenage girls, these Golden State Warriors in pigtails, stopped him from stumbling into a dark well of despair. They were his light, and they became an example of what writing can do.

It can heal, and that is a mighty powerful thing.

]]> The Auburn Conference 63920580 199 Tom Piazza 160938881X Jeri 3 argosy-book-group
I loved "City of Refuge" because New Orleans figures big in my personal history, and Piazza knows the city. He's not a native. But he's lived there for years, after being the principal writer of HBO's "Treme" and penning the book, "Why New Orleans Matters," he knows the streets and the nuances.

So, yeah, I gave "City of Refuge" four stars. I'm a former editor of a alt-weekly, and the scenes Piazza painted did ring true. As for "Auburn Conference," I gave it three. Maybe 3 1/2

Some of my book-club buddies gave it four. Oh, I understand. It was quite the romp. Piazza got the idea during a long drive from Virginia to New Orleans in 2018, and depending where Piazza left from, that's at least a 10- to 12-hour drive. And it was a novel idea. It was right after the mid-term elections, a time when our country felt so uncertain -- and still does. And Piazza's concoction of this imagined conference comes at a time when America was young, still smarting from the Civil War.

Piazza did his some kind of research for "Auburn Conference." He read the books of these literary giants. But he also plowed into their speeches, journals, letters, and comments about them by their friends, family, and contemporaries. From that he got great details, like the fact that Frederick Douglass had a violin that he liked to play in quiet times, or that Melville wrote poems about roses late in life.

Then, he wrote. About that, Piazza says:

"At some point you have to shift from being yoked to a preexisting set of facts and accept that you are creating a new being, a fictional character. The research is there to serve the characters, not the other way around. The Auburn Conference isn’t a historical tract. As soon as you put recognizable personages into a work of fiction, they become imagined characters. As a fiction writer you have to claim that authority for yourself.�

Oh, I liked it. Really did. It's funny, with laugh-out-loud momentss. And what Piazza showed that what they struggled that imaginary weekend some 140 years ago -- What's it like to be an American -- felt very present-day.

But "Auburn Conference" didn't move me like "City of Refuge." But that's OK. A writer with a great imagintion, I'll read time and again. That's why book clubs work. I never would have picked up this book without someone saying, "This is our next book!" But I found "City of Refuge" through "Auburn Conference." And I found a writer I know I'll always enjoy.


Piazza's narrator, an adjunct college professor who arranged the conference, ended the book this way: "Whitman, Twain, Melville, Douglass, Stowe ... I have their voices in my ear, and I cannot get rid of them. I still believe in America. God help me –� I still believe in America."]]> 3.76 The Auburn Conference
author: Tom Piazza
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.76
book published:
rating: 3
read at: 2024/05/25
date added: 2024/06/06
shelves: argosy-book-group
review:
Over the past month, I went on a Tom Piazza jag. I read his novels "City of Refuge" and "Auburn Conference." "City of Refuge" details Hurricane Katrina through the lens of two residents -- a lower Ninth native and an alt-weekly editor; "Auburn Conference" was an imagined literary confab in 1880s featuring some of the biggest literary minds at that time ... and well ... as all time. I mean, Whitman and Twain and Melville and Stowe and Douglass and Dickinson. A lot of wow there.

I loved "City of Refuge" because New Orleans figures big in my personal history, and Piazza knows the city. He's not a native. But he's lived there for years, after being the principal writer of HBO's "Treme" and penning the book, "Why New Orleans Matters," he knows the streets and the nuances.

So, yeah, I gave "City of Refuge" four stars. I'm a former editor of a alt-weekly, and the scenes Piazza painted did ring true. As for "Auburn Conference," I gave it three. Maybe 3 1/2

Some of my book-club buddies gave it four. Oh, I understand. It was quite the romp. Piazza got the idea during a long drive from Virginia to New Orleans in 2018, and depending where Piazza left from, that's at least a 10- to 12-hour drive. And it was a novel idea. It was right after the mid-term elections, a time when our country felt so uncertain -- and still does. And Piazza's concoction of this imagined conference comes at a time when America was young, still smarting from the Civil War.

Piazza did his some kind of research for "Auburn Conference." He read the books of these literary giants. But he also plowed into their speeches, journals, letters, and comments about them by their friends, family, and contemporaries. From that he got great details, like the fact that Frederick Douglass had a violin that he liked to play in quiet times, or that Melville wrote poems about roses late in life.

Then, he wrote. About that, Piazza says:

"At some point you have to shift from being yoked to a preexisting set of facts and accept that you are creating a new being, a fictional character. The research is there to serve the characters, not the other way around. The Auburn Conference isn’t a historical tract. As soon as you put recognizable personages into a work of fiction, they become imagined characters. As a fiction writer you have to claim that authority for yourself.�

Oh, I liked it. Really did. It's funny, with laugh-out-loud momentss. And what Piazza showed that what they struggled that imaginary weekend some 140 years ago -- What's it like to be an American -- felt very present-day.

But "Auburn Conference" didn't move me like "City of Refuge." But that's OK. A writer with a great imagintion, I'll read time and again. That's why book clubs work. I never would have picked up this book without someone saying, "This is our next book!" But I found "City of Refuge" through "Auburn Conference." And I found a writer I know I'll always enjoy.


Piazza's narrator, an adjunct college professor who arranged the conference, ended the book this way: "Whitman, Twain, Melville, Douglass, Stowe ... I have their voices in my ear, and I cannot get rid of them. I still believe in America. God help me –� I still believe in America."
]]> City of Refuge 2948134
SJ Williams, a carpenter and widower, lives and works in the Lower Ninth Ward community where he was born and raised. Across town, Craig Donaldson, a Midwestern transplant and the editor of the city's alternative paper, faces deepening cracks in his family. When the news of the gathering hurricane spreadsâ and when the levees give way and the floodwaters comeâ the fate of each family changes forever.]]> 416 Tom Piazza 0061238619 Jeri 4 pleasure-read 4.01 2008 City of Refuge
author: Tom Piazza
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2008
rating: 4
read at: 2024/05/12
date added: 2024/05/12
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
Loved this book. Review to come.
]]> <![CDATA[Glucose Revolution: The Life-Changing Power of Balancing Your Blood Sugar]]> 58438618
Glucose, or blood sugar, is a tiny molecule in our body that has a huge impact on our health. It enters our bloodstream through the starchy or sweet foods we eat. Ninety percent of us suffer from too much glucose in our system—and most of us don't know it.

The symptoms? Cravings, fatigue, infertility, hormonal issues, acne, wrinkles� And over time, the development of conditions like type 2 diabetes, polycystic ovarian syndrome, cancer, dementia, and heart disease.

Drawing on cutting-edge science and her own pioneering research, biochemist Jessie Inchauspé offers ten simple, surprising hacks to help you balance your glucose levels and reverse your symptoms—without going on a diet or giving up the foods you love. For example:
* How eating foods in the right order will make you lose weight effortlessly
* What secret ingredient will allow you to eat dessert and still go into fat-burning mode
* What small change to your breakfast will unlock energy and cut your cravings

Both entertaining, informative, and packed with the latest scientific data, this book presents a new way to think about better health. Glucose Revolution is chock-full of tips that can drastically and immediately improve your life, whatever your dietary preferences.]]> 304 Jessie Inchauspé 1982179414 Jeri 4 pleasure-read
Katie is a good friend of mine who is all into wellness and meditation, and she recommended "On Purpose with Jay Shetty," a podcast she enjoyed. I started listening, and I liked it. A month or two ago, Jessie InChauspe was one of Shetty's guests, and she dove deep into "Glucose Revolution," which came out in 2022. She was funny, informative, a writer who knows her science. She earned a master's in biochemistry from Georgetown and worked for a genetic analysis start-up in Silicon Valley. Yet, what made the book was her own personal story.

She had to endure her own glucose spikes after a life-threatening injury. So, like she does in her day job, she turned to research and data mining. But this time, she researched and data mined for her own well-being and health. She looked for ways to help keep her glucose in check, and when she discovered what worked, she wanted to share it with others and created the "Glucose Goddess" page on Instagram. And that page in cyberspace became her book.

Now, to me.

For years, I've seen my own blood sugar rise, and I've worked constantly to keep it in check with diet and exercise and sleep. But I wondered what else I could do. So I gave "Glucose Revolution" a try. I mean, I NEVER read diet books or books dealing with any kind of science. But "Glucose Revolution" was worth it.

It's an easy, breezy read. Inchauspe writes in a very conversational style, and she breaks down the science of glucose into something understandable by using real-life stories she has accumulated from her "Glucose Goddess" page on Instagram. And as I read them, I could see myself in the people she profiled.

Moreover, she gives you 10 simple, yet effective hacks that will help you lose weight, get more energy and stop those cravings that hit all of us. I mean, easy stuff.

Like eat your leafy greens and fiber first and then your protein before you go to your carbs.

Or walk 10 to 20 minutes after you eat.

Or a tablespoon of vinegar 20 minutes before you eat.

See? You're like, really? That will flatten my glucose? Really? Yes, really. And Inchauspe backs all that up with solid science.

Throughout "Glucose Revolution," Inchauspe helps you understand the science of what's inside us and how we all can be the best friend of our body and not make the stranger we often make it.

So, yeah, I enjoyed "Glucose Revolution, and I've started trying out these hacks. I'm curious to see how it goes.

And Katie? Thanks.

]]> 4.42 2022 Glucose Revolution: The Life-Changing Power of Balancing Your Blood Sugar
author: Jessie Inchauspé
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.42
book published: 2022
rating: 4
read at: 2024/05/05
date added: 2024/05/05
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
I discovered "Glucose Revolution" by luck.

Katie is a good friend of mine who is all into wellness and meditation, and she recommended "On Purpose with Jay Shetty," a podcast she enjoyed. I started listening, and I liked it. A month or two ago, Jessie InChauspe was one of Shetty's guests, and she dove deep into "Glucose Revolution," which came out in 2022. She was funny, informative, a writer who knows her science. She earned a master's in biochemistry from Georgetown and worked for a genetic analysis start-up in Silicon Valley. Yet, what made the book was her own personal story.

She had to endure her own glucose spikes after a life-threatening injury. So, like she does in her day job, she turned to research and data mining. But this time, she researched and data mined for her own well-being and health. She looked for ways to help keep her glucose in check, and when she discovered what worked, she wanted to share it with others and created the "Glucose Goddess" page on Instagram. And that page in cyberspace became her book.

Now, to me.

For years, I've seen my own blood sugar rise, and I've worked constantly to keep it in check with diet and exercise and sleep. But I wondered what else I could do. So I gave "Glucose Revolution" a try. I mean, I NEVER read diet books or books dealing with any kind of science. But "Glucose Revolution" was worth it.

It's an easy, breezy read. Inchauspe writes in a very conversational style, and she breaks down the science of glucose into something understandable by using real-life stories she has accumulated from her "Glucose Goddess" page on Instagram. And as I read them, I could see myself in the people she profiled.

Moreover, she gives you 10 simple, yet effective hacks that will help you lose weight, get more energy and stop those cravings that hit all of us. I mean, easy stuff.

Like eat your leafy greens and fiber first and then your protein before you go to your carbs.

Or walk 10 to 20 minutes after you eat.

Or a tablespoon of vinegar 20 minutes before you eat.

See? You're like, really? That will flatten my glucose? Really? Yes, really. And Inchauspe backs all that up with solid science.

Throughout "Glucose Revolution," Inchauspe helps you understand the science of what's inside us and how we all can be the best friend of our body and not make the stranger we often make it.

So, yeah, I enjoyed "Glucose Revolution, and I've started trying out these hacks. I'm curious to see how it goes.

And Katie? Thanks.


]]> Wandering Stars 174147294
Colorado, 1864. Star, a young survivor of the Sand Creek Massacre, is brought to the Fort Marion Prison Castle, where he is forced to learn English and practice Christianity by Richard Henry Pratt, an evangelical prison guard who will go on to found the Carlisle Indian Industrial School, an institution dedicated to the eradication of Native history, culture, and identity. A generation later, Star’s son, Charles, is sent to the school, where he is brutalized by the man who was once his father’s jailer. Under Pratt’s harsh treatment, Charles clings to moments he shares with a young fellow student, Opal Viola, as the two envision a future away from the institutional violence that follows their bloodlines.

Oakland, 2018. Opal Viola Victoria Bear Shield is barely holding her family together after the shooting that nearly took the life of her nephew Orvil. From the moment he awakens in his hospital bed, Orvil begins compulsively googling school shootings on YouTube. He also becomes emotionally reliant on the prescription medications meant to ease his physical trauma. His younger brother, Lony, suffering from PTSD, is struggling to make sense of the carnage he witnessed at the shooting by secretly cutting himself and enacting blood rituals that he hopes will connect him to his Cheyenne heritage. Opal is equally adrift, experimenting with Ceremony and peyote, searching for a way to heal her wounded family.

Extending his constellation of narratives into the past and future, Tommy Orange once again delivers a story that is by turns shattering and wondrous, a book piercing in its poetry, sorrow, and rage—a masterful follow-up to his already-classic first novel, and a devastating indictment of America’s war on its own people.]]> 315 Tommy Orange 0593318250 Jeri 3 argosy-book-group
Now, to "Wandering Stars."

I really wanted to like it. It seems Orange took an ambitious swing at telling the story of a Native American family that stretches back 150 years. He wanted to show how trauma travels from one generation to another. With "Wandering Stars," he presented it as a sequel to his successful first novel, "There There."

But I felt Orange was trying to do too much with his sophomore effort. I wish he would have stayed with the present and told that story and flash-backed to the gut-wrenching scenes from the family's past. And they are gut-wrenching. He didn't.

He told his story in a linear fashion, in segments, and I felt that style slowed the narrative. "Wandering Stars" didn't really take off for me until around 150 pages when Orange went from recreating the past to unveiling the present. The review from The New Yorker seemed to feel the same way. It wrote: "The book appears to suffer from the same condition as its characters; it cannot see itself, cannot see that it need not hammer home every theme every time, that it speeds where it should saunter, tarries where we need to move."

And yet, for a guy who really didn't get into reading until he worked in a bookstore in his 20s, Orange is a writer to watch. He has a deft hand in creating prose that sings. For example, here's one:

**
I think I needed to feel the bottom to know how to rise. Maybe we're all looking for our bottoms and tops in search of balance, where the loop feels just right, and like it's not just rote, not just repetition, but a beautiful echo, one so entrancing we lose ourselves in it.
**

Nice.

So, will I read Orange again? Of course. Sure, I was kinda "Meh" on both "There There," and "Wandering Stars." Still, Orange is 42, and his talent will only grow. I mean, writers know they don't retire. They just keep going.

So, I'm looking forward to see where Orange goes. Like the writer and poet Clint Smith, we need Orange's voice in our world.]]> 3.83 2024 Wandering Stars
author: Tommy Orange
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.83
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2024/04/27
date added: 2024/04/29
shelves: argosy-book-group
review:
I do believe Tommy Orange is an important voice in literature. As a member of the Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribe in Oklahoma, he has become almost by accident a Native American advocate for what is real and true and needed. He unveils a more authentic portrait of Native Americans today, and as he did with "Wandering Stars," he reveals Native American history that we as Americans need to read and understand.

Now, to "Wandering Stars."

I really wanted to like it. It seems Orange took an ambitious swing at telling the story of a Native American family that stretches back 150 years. He wanted to show how trauma travels from one generation to another. With "Wandering Stars," he presented it as a sequel to his successful first novel, "There There."

But I felt Orange was trying to do too much with his sophomore effort. I wish he would have stayed with the present and told that story and flash-backed to the gut-wrenching scenes from the family's past. And they are gut-wrenching. He didn't.

He told his story in a linear fashion, in segments, and I felt that style slowed the narrative. "Wandering Stars" didn't really take off for me until around 150 pages when Orange went from recreating the past to unveiling the present. The review from The New Yorker seemed to feel the same way. It wrote: "The book appears to suffer from the same condition as its characters; it cannot see itself, cannot see that it need not hammer home every theme every time, that it speeds where it should saunter, tarries where we need to move."

And yet, for a guy who really didn't get into reading until he worked in a bookstore in his 20s, Orange is a writer to watch. He has a deft hand in creating prose that sings. For example, here's one:

**
I think I needed to feel the bottom to know how to rise. Maybe we're all looking for our bottoms and tops in search of balance, where the loop feels just right, and like it's not just rote, not just repetition, but a beautiful echo, one so entrancing we lose ourselves in it.
**

Nice.

So, will I read Orange again? Of course. Sure, I was kinda "Meh" on both "There There," and "Wandering Stars." Still, Orange is 42, and his talent will only grow. I mean, writers know they don't retire. They just keep going.

So, I'm looking forward to see where Orange goes. Like the writer and poet Clint Smith, we need Orange's voice in our world.
]]> <![CDATA[Robert E. Lee and Me: A Southerner's Reckoning with the Myth of the Lost Cause]]> 53138120
In a forceful but humane narrative, former soldier and head of the West Point history department Ty Seidule's Robert E. Lee and Me challenges the myths and lies of the Confederate legacy—and explores why some of this country’s oldest wounds have never healed.

Ty Seidule grew up revering Robert E. Lee. From his southern childhood to his service in the U.S. Army, every part of his life reinforced the Lost Cause myth: that Lee was the greatest man who ever lived, and that the Confederates were underdogs who lost the Civil War with honor. Now, as a retired brigadier general and Professor Emeritus of History at West Point, his view has radically changed. From a soldier, a scholar, and a southerner, Ty Seidule believes that American history demands a reckoning.

In a unique blend of history and reflection, Seidule deconstructs the truth about the Confederacy—that its undisputed primary goal was the subjugation and enslavement of Black Americans—and directly challenges the idea of honoring those who labored to preserve that system and committed treason in their failed attempt to achieve it. Through the arc of Seidule’s own life, as well as the culture that formed him, he seeks a path to understanding why the facts of the Civil War have remained buried beneath layers of myth and even outright lies—and how they embody a cultural gulf that separates millions of Americans to this day.

Part history lecture, part meditation on the Civil War and its fallout, and part memoir, Robert E. Lee and Me challenges the deeply-held legends and myths of the Confederacy—and provides a surprising interpretation of essential truths that our country still has a difficult time articulating and accepting.]]> 291 Ty Seidule 1250239265 Jeri 5 4.40 2021 Robert E. Lee and Me: A Southerner's Reckoning with the Myth of the Lost Cause
author: Ty Seidule
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.40
book published: 2021
rating: 5
read at: 2024/03/29
date added: 2024/03/29
shelves:
review:

]]> Whalefall 62919162 327 Daniel Kraus 1665918160 Jeri 4 argosy-book-group
My friend Don, a voracious reader, recommended it. He told me his son Gabriel read the book in one day, from 11 in the morning to 11 at night from what I remember. Gabriel simply couldn't put it down. OK, I thought. I trust Don –� usually. ––and he gave me the hard sell on "Whalefall." Don leaned forward and whispered, "I want you to read it."

Sure, it was our book club pick. So, I had to begin. Still, I couldn't really cotton to reading a story about a teenager named Jay getting swallowed by a sperm whale while looking for his dad's remains off the coast of California. Crazy, right? I thought so, too. Just a modern-day Jonah, a take from a writer who helped filmmaker Guillermo del Toro write the 2017 film, "The Shape of Water."

I liked "The Shape of Water." So, I figured there was a chance with "Whalefall." Soon, though, I found myself feeling a lot like Gabriel.

It started off slow. But once Jay jumped into the ocean, it became quite the ride. I stayed up late. I skipped two early-morning exercises on two consecutive days. I wanted to see what would happen next. Daniel Kraus is quite the storyteller. Before "Whalefall," he has penned more than a novel and graphic novels. So he was an expert with pace. But what really grabbed me was not the whale. But what the whale represented. It became the metaphor of Jay's father, Mitt, a local scuba diving legend who Jay found hard to love.

Mitt pushed Jay to be more like a man and chided him when he found him crying. A classic example of toxic masculinity. So, the fractious father-son relationship added tension to the boy-in-a-whale tale.

Page after page, Jay began to have conversations with his dad while in the belly of a whale. Like all good books, "Whalefall" tackled the universal theme of reconciliation. Jay had to face the ugly truths of his life -- lack of affection from his father, the lack of affection he had for his dad and Jay's decision to abandon his cancer-stricken dad. As he scrapped to get out of the whale, Jay scrapped with wondering how he should -- or could -- show his dad mercy, even love.

That's when the book went to another level for me. I kinda expected that from the way Don pitched it to me. But what I didn't expect was to get emotional about it. I teared up. Right there on page 287. I had never done that before. Never. For any book. Why? Yeah, i was early. I was ripping through the book at 5:30 in the morning. But really, it was the exchange that came at the end of Kraus' many short chapters. It was this imaginative exchange between Jay and Mitt, his dead father.

"But maybe I can teach you things."
(I am sure you will Daddy)
"So one day you can live the life you want. Anything you want."
"Why are you in such a hurry Daddy)
"I'll make sure of that. I'll give you all the tools."
(I do not want tools Daddy)
"So when it matters, Son, you'll know what to do."
(Daddy all I want is you)

I shut the book. An emotional knot got stuck in my throat, and a tear or two came. I didn't think of Jay. I thought of my son, my oldest child. We're close. He's 25 on his own adult journey. Still, I'll forever see him in my mind's eye the day he was born. He was just an hour old, and I leaned into his bassinet, said something innocuous like, "Hey, man" and he looked up, grinned and grabbed my two index fingers.

So, that passage on page 287 hit home for me."Whalefall" did, too. Sure, the ending was a bit preposterous. But Daniel Kraus delivers a book that moved me to think about my own life, my own family, my own ugly truths. And that is why I read.]]> 3.66 2023 Whalefall
author: Daniel Kraus
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.66
book published: 2023
rating: 4
read at: 2023/11/15
date added: 2024/03/23
shelves: argosy-book-group
review:
Honestly, I had low expectations for Daniel Kraus' "Whalefall."

My friend Don, a voracious reader, recommended it. He told me his son Gabriel read the book in one day, from 11 in the morning to 11 at night from what I remember. Gabriel simply couldn't put it down. OK, I thought. I trust Don –� usually. ––and he gave me the hard sell on "Whalefall." Don leaned forward and whispered, "I want you to read it."

Sure, it was our book club pick. So, I had to begin. Still, I couldn't really cotton to reading a story about a teenager named Jay getting swallowed by a sperm whale while looking for his dad's remains off the coast of California. Crazy, right? I thought so, too. Just a modern-day Jonah, a take from a writer who helped filmmaker Guillermo del Toro write the 2017 film, "The Shape of Water."

I liked "The Shape of Water." So, I figured there was a chance with "Whalefall." Soon, though, I found myself feeling a lot like Gabriel.

It started off slow. But once Jay jumped into the ocean, it became quite the ride. I stayed up late. I skipped two early-morning exercises on two consecutive days. I wanted to see what would happen next. Daniel Kraus is quite the storyteller. Before "Whalefall," he has penned more than a novel and graphic novels. So he was an expert with pace. But what really grabbed me was not the whale. But what the whale represented. It became the metaphor of Jay's father, Mitt, a local scuba diving legend who Jay found hard to love.

Mitt pushed Jay to be more like a man and chided him when he found him crying. A classic example of toxic masculinity. So, the fractious father-son relationship added tension to the boy-in-a-whale tale.

Page after page, Jay began to have conversations with his dad while in the belly of a whale. Like all good books, "Whalefall" tackled the universal theme of reconciliation. Jay had to face the ugly truths of his life -- lack of affection from his father, the lack of affection he had for his dad and Jay's decision to abandon his cancer-stricken dad. As he scrapped to get out of the whale, Jay scrapped with wondering how he should -- or could -- show his dad mercy, even love.

That's when the book went to another level for me. I kinda expected that from the way Don pitched it to me. But what I didn't expect was to get emotional about it. I teared up. Right there on page 287. I had never done that before. Never. For any book. Why? Yeah, i was early. I was ripping through the book at 5:30 in the morning. But really, it was the exchange that came at the end of Kraus' many short chapters. It was this imaginative exchange between Jay and Mitt, his dead father.

"But maybe I can teach you things."
(I am sure you will Daddy)
"So one day you can live the life you want. Anything you want."
"Why are you in such a hurry Daddy)
"I'll make sure of that. I'll give you all the tools."
(I do not want tools Daddy)
"So when it matters, Son, you'll know what to do."
(Daddy all I want is you)

I shut the book. An emotional knot got stuck in my throat, and a tear or two came. I didn't think of Jay. I thought of my son, my oldest child. We're close. He's 25 on his own adult journey. Still, I'll forever see him in my mind's eye the day he was born. He was just an hour old, and I leaned into his bassinet, said something innocuous like, "Hey, man" and he looked up, grinned and grabbed my two index fingers.

So, that passage on page 287 hit home for me."Whalefall" did, too. Sure, the ending was a bit preposterous. But Daniel Kraus delivers a book that moved me to think about my own life, my own family, my own ugly truths. And that is why I read.
]]> Long Walk to Freedom 318431
Since his triumphant release in 1990 from more than a quarter-century of imprisonment, Mandela has been at the center of the most compelling and inspiring political drama in the world. As president of the African National Congress and head of South Africa's anti-apartheid movement, he was instrumental in moving the nation toward multiracial government and majority rule. He is revered everywhere as a vital force in the fight for human rights and racial equality.

The foster son of a Thembu chief, Mandela was raised in the traditional, tribal culture of his ancestors, but at an early age learned the modern, inescapable reality of what came to be called apartheid, one of the most powerful and effective systems of oppression ever conceived. In classically elegant and engrossing prose, he tells of his early years as an impoverished student and law clerk in a Jewish firm in Johannesburg, of his slow political awakening, and of his pivotal role in the rebirth of a stagnant ANC and the formation of its Youth League in the 1950s.

He describes the struggle to reconcile his political activity with his devotion to his family, the anguished breakup of his first marriage, and the painful separations from his children. He brings vividly to life the escalating political warfare in the fifties between the ANC and the government, culminating in his dramatic escapades as an underground leader and the notorious Rivonia Trial of 1964, at which he was sentenced to life imprisonment. Herecounts the surprisingly eventful twenty-seven years in prison and the complex, delicate negotiations that led both to his freedom and to the beginning of the end of apartheid. Finally he provides the ultimate inside account.]]> 656 Nelson Mandela 0316548189 Jeri 5 work-read Review TK 4.34 1994 Long Walk to Freedom
author: Nelson Mandela
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.34
book published: 1994
rating: 5
read at: 2024/03/17
date added: 2024/03/20
shelves: work-read
review:
Review TK
]]> Prophet Song 158875813
On a dark, wet evening in Dublin, scientist and mother-of-four Eilish Stack answers her front door to find the GNSB on her step. Two officers from Ireland’s newly formed secret police are here to interrogate her husband, a trade unionist.

Ireland is falling apart. The country is in the grip of a government turning towards tyranny and Eilish can only watch helplessly as the world she knew disappears. When first her husband and then her eldest son vanish, Eilish finds herself caught within the nightmare logic of a collapsing society.

How far will she go to save her family? And what � or who � is she willing to leave behind?

Exhilarating, terrifying and propulsive, Prophet Song is a work of breathtaking originality, offering a devastating vision of a country at war and a deeply human portrait of a mother’s fight to hold her family together.]]> 259 Paul Lynch Jeri 5 argosy-book-group Review TK 4.03 2023 Prophet Song
author: Paul Lynch
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.03
book published: 2023
rating: 5
read at: 2024/03/09
date added: 2024/03/10
shelves: argosy-book-group
review:
Review TK
]]> <![CDATA[Your Brain on Art: How the Arts Transform Us]]> 61358662 A life-altering journey through the science of neuroaesthetics, which offers proof for how our brains and bodies transform when we participate in the arts--and how this knowledge can improve our health, enable us to flourish, and build stronger communities.

"This book blew my mind!"--Angela Duckworth, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Grit

Many of us think of the arts as entertainment--a luxury of some kind. In Your Brain on Art, authors Susan Magsamen and Ivy Ross show how activities from painting and dancing to expressive writing, architecture, and more are essential to our lives.

We're on the verge of a cultural shift in which the arts can deliver potent, accessible, and proven solutions for the well-being of everyone. Magsamen and Ross offer compelling research that shows how engaging in an art project for as little as forty-five minutes reduces the stress hormone cortisol, no matter your skill level, and just one art experience per month can extend your life by ten years. They expand our understanding of how playing music builds cognitive skills and enhances learning; the vibrations of a tuning fork create sound waves to counteract stress; virtual reality can provide cutting-edge therapeutic benefit; and interactive exhibits dissolve the boundaries between art and viewers, engaging all of our senses and strengthening memory. Doctors have even been prescribing museum visits to address loneliness, dementia, and many other physical and mental health concerns.

Your Brain on Art is a portal into this new understanding about how the arts and aesthetics can help us transform traditional medicine, build healthier communities, and mend an aching planet.

Featuring conversations with artists such as David Byrne, Ren�e Fleming, and evolutionary biologist E. O. Wilson, Your Brain On Art is an authoritative guide neuroaesthetics. The book weaves a tapestry of breakthrough research, insights from multidisciplinary pioneers, and compelling stories from people who are using the arts to enhance their lives.]]> 304 Susan Magsamen 0593449231 Jeri 5 pleasure-read 3.88 2023 Your Brain on Art: How the Arts Transform Us
author: Susan Magsamen
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.88
book published: 2023
rating: 5
read at: 2024/02/24
date added: 2024/03/04
shelves: pleasure-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Fourth Wing (The Empyrean, #1)]]> 61431922 Enter the brutal and elite world of a war college for dragon riders...

Twenty-year-old Violet Sorrengail was supposed to enter the Scribe Quadrant, living a quiet life among books and history. Now, the commanding general—also known as her tough-as-talons mother—has ordered Violet to join the hundreds of candidates striving to become the elite of Navarre: dragon riders.

But when you’re smaller than everyone else and your body is brittle, death is only a heartbeat away...because dragons don’t bond to “fragile� humans. They incinerate them.

With fewer dragons willing to bond than cadets, most would kill Violet to better their own chances of success. The rest would kill her just for being her mother’s daughter—like Xaden Riorson, the most powerful and ruthless wingleader in the Riders Quadrant.

She’ll need every edge her wits can give her just to see the next sunrise.

Yet, with every day that passes, the war outside grows more deadly, the kingdom's protective wards are failing, and the death toll continues to rise. Even worse, Violet begins to suspect leadership is hiding a terrible secret.

Friends, enemies, lovers. Everyone at Basgiath War College has an agenda—because once you enter, there are only two ways out: graduate or die]]> 528 Rebecca Yarros 1649374046 Jeri 4 pleasure-read
I did like Smaug. But I never saw dragon books as something I'd even consider. That changed right before Christmas.

My book friend Natalie and I were talking one day, and she reminded me that she has read 80 books last year. Wait a minute, 80 books? Natalie responded: "You read all those serious books. I read books about dragons."

OK.

A few weeks later, a sharp, book-savvy 20something I know urged me to read "Fourth Wing." Her name is Mary, and she and I work together at a North Carolina university. I told her I'd probably pass. She asked me about it again. I told her the same thing. She then put "Fourth Wing" on the bookshelf in my office, like some Elf on a Shelf at Christmas. I didn't see it for weeks.

"I can't believe you didn't see it," she told me.

It's a thick book.

Then, Mary's polite badgering began. Every few days, she'd ask me about it. Probably not, I'd tell her. Finally, after finishing a novel about two brothers, both guns for hire in the Old West, I broke down.

Yeah, I told Mary, I'll give it a try.

I thought of Natalie. She likes this stuff, and she teaches IB at a North Carolina high school near the coast. And Mary, she's right-brain creative, a woman who sees a computer screen as her canvas. So, I thought, why not. Take the plunge. I did like Smaug. So, I did. I have to admit it was fun. Wicked fun.

I know it sounds cliche, but I couldn't put the book down. I read "Fourth Wing" late at night. Twice, I fell asleep on it. Another time, I woke up three hours before daybreak so I could finagle two hours of reading time to find out what happened next. And with four pages to go in a 498-page book, I put it down, went back to sleep and woke up at sunrise to see how everything ends.

What surprised me the most was how quickly I finished it. With 498 pages, I thought "Fourth Wing" would be a slog. Nope. I betcha I finished it in 11 days. That never happens with a book that could front as a doorstop.

"Fourth Wing" is a book I thought I'd never read. The romance was over the top -- "spicy," Mary called it -- and reminded me of some ripped-bodice novel. And the world Rebecca Yarros created on paper is too one-dimensional. So, why did I devour it like some Harry Potter fanboy?

Yarros has a knack for creating memorable characters and a classic good-vs-evil plot with a "Luke, I am your father" twist. Moreover, she has a gift for crafting tension akin to pulp fiction that sparks readers to turn the page. That's what made it fun for me. It reminded me of those books I read when I was way younger like "Treasure Island," "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea," and "King Solomon's Mines." Those books kept me between the stacks of my local library and turned me into a reader at a time when Brooks Robinson was my hero and a baseball diamond was my every-day playground.

It's no wonder Yarros' Empyrean series has captivated a loyal following like what JK Rowling grabbed with Harry Potter. Matter of fact, Amazon will turn "Fourth Wing" and the follow-up "Iron Flame" into a series. And that's just two of the five books slated in the series.

And like Rowling, Yarros has a backstory that feels so ... storybook.

She wrote the book while her husband, an Army veteran, was deployed in Afghanistan and Iraq. And he went four times, from what I remember reading. And it's not like she wasn't maneuvering some tough minefields in her life. She and her husband have six children, including a daughter they adopted who is autistic and nonverbal. And Yarros has a genetic disorder that has her dealing with chronic pain.

Despite all that, she found time to write. Writing, it seems, was her therapy. I can so understand that.

I imagine Natalie will love that I finally read a dragon book. I'll just have to tell her I won't get a dragon tattoo like she did. As for Mary, I'll tell her that she won't have to leave another Rebecca Yarros dragon tome on my bookshelf. She won't even have to badger me.

I'll read it. Yes, I will. I mean, I do like Tairn. That is one bad-ass dragon.]]> 4.56 2023 Fourth Wing (The Empyrean, #1)
author: Rebecca Yarros
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.56
book published: 2023
rating: 4
read at: 2024/01/28
date added: 2024/02/17
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
OK, I haven't read a book on dragons in like forever. The last time was, maybe, 17 years ago when I read JRR Tolkien's "The Hobbit" to my kids. That was the third time I had read it. The first two times? Way before the Internet when my age entered double digits and I had tacked to my bedroom wall a calendar of sumptuous illustrations from Tolkien's "The Lord of the Rings."

I did like Smaug. But I never saw dragon books as something I'd even consider. That changed right before Christmas.

My book friend Natalie and I were talking one day, and she reminded me that she has read 80 books last year. Wait a minute, 80 books? Natalie responded: "You read all those serious books. I read books about dragons."

OK.

A few weeks later, a sharp, book-savvy 20something I know urged me to read "Fourth Wing." Her name is Mary, and she and I work together at a North Carolina university. I told her I'd probably pass. She asked me about it again. I told her the same thing. She then put "Fourth Wing" on the bookshelf in my office, like some Elf on a Shelf at Christmas. I didn't see it for weeks.

"I can't believe you didn't see it," she told me.

It's a thick book.

Then, Mary's polite badgering began. Every few days, she'd ask me about it. Probably not, I'd tell her. Finally, after finishing a novel about two brothers, both guns for hire in the Old West, I broke down.

Yeah, I told Mary, I'll give it a try.

I thought of Natalie. She likes this stuff, and she teaches IB at a North Carolina high school near the coast. And Mary, she's right-brain creative, a woman who sees a computer screen as her canvas. So, I thought, why not. Take the plunge. I did like Smaug. So, I did. I have to admit it was fun. Wicked fun.

I know it sounds cliche, but I couldn't put the book down. I read "Fourth Wing" late at night. Twice, I fell asleep on it. Another time, I woke up three hours before daybreak so I could finagle two hours of reading time to find out what happened next. And with four pages to go in a 498-page book, I put it down, went back to sleep and woke up at sunrise to see how everything ends.

What surprised me the most was how quickly I finished it. With 498 pages, I thought "Fourth Wing" would be a slog. Nope. I betcha I finished it in 11 days. That never happens with a book that could front as a doorstop.

"Fourth Wing" is a book I thought I'd never read. The romance was over the top -- "spicy," Mary called it -- and reminded me of some ripped-bodice novel. And the world Rebecca Yarros created on paper is too one-dimensional. So, why did I devour it like some Harry Potter fanboy?

Yarros has a knack for creating memorable characters and a classic good-vs-evil plot with a "Luke, I am your father" twist. Moreover, she has a gift for crafting tension akin to pulp fiction that sparks readers to turn the page. That's what made it fun for me. It reminded me of those books I read when I was way younger like "Treasure Island," "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea," and "King Solomon's Mines." Those books kept me between the stacks of my local library and turned me into a reader at a time when Brooks Robinson was my hero and a baseball diamond was my every-day playground.

It's no wonder Yarros' Empyrean series has captivated a loyal following like what JK Rowling grabbed with Harry Potter. Matter of fact, Amazon will turn "Fourth Wing" and the follow-up "Iron Flame" into a series. And that's just two of the five books slated in the series.

And like Rowling, Yarros has a backstory that feels so ... storybook.

She wrote the book while her husband, an Army veteran, was deployed in Afghanistan and Iraq. And he went four times, from what I remember reading. And it's not like she wasn't maneuvering some tough minefields in her life. She and her husband have six children, including a daughter they adopted who is autistic and nonverbal. And Yarros has a genetic disorder that has her dealing with chronic pain.

Despite all that, she found time to write. Writing, it seems, was her therapy. I can so understand that.

I imagine Natalie will love that I finally read a dragon book. I'll just have to tell her I won't get a dragon tattoo like she did. As for Mary, I'll tell her that she won't have to leave another Rebecca Yarros dragon tome on my bookshelf. She won't even have to badger me.

I'll read it. Yes, I will. I mean, I do like Tairn. That is one bad-ass dragon.
]]> <![CDATA[The Passenger (The Passenger #1)]]> 60581087
Traversing the American South, from the garrulous barrooms of New Orleans to an abandoned oil rig off the Florida coast, The Passenger is a breathtaking novel of morality and science, the legacy of sin, and the madness that is human consciousness.]]> 385 Cormac McCarthy 0593535227 Jeri 3 argosy-book-group Review TK 3.58 2022 The Passenger (The Passenger #1)
author: Cormac McCarthy
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.58
book published: 2022
rating: 3
read at: 2023/02/27
date added: 2024/02/15
shelves: argosy-book-group
review:
Review TK
]]> The Sisters Brothers 9850443
With The Sisters Brothers, Patrick deWitt pays homage to the classic Western, transforming it into an unforgettable comic tour de force. Filled with a remarkable cast of characters - losers, cheaters, and ne'er-do-wells from all stripes of life - and told by a complex and compelling narrator, it is a violent, lustful odyssey through the underworld of the 1850s frontier that beautifully captures the humor, melancholy, and grit of the Old West, and two brothers bound by blood, violence, and love.]]> 328 Patrick deWitt 0062041266 Jeri 4 Review TK 3.84 2011 The Sisters Brothers
author: Patrick deWitt
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.84
book published: 2011
rating: 4
read at: 2024/01/18
date added: 2024/01/18
shelves:
review:
Review TK
]]> <![CDATA[At Hell's Gate: A Soldier's Journey from War to Peace]]> 497471
When Thomas returned home he found that he continued to live in a state of war. He was overwhelmed by feelings of guilt, fear, anger, and despair, all of which were intensified by the rejection he experienced as a Vietnam veteran. For years, Thomas struggled with post-traumatic stress, drug and alcohol addiction, isolation, and even homelessness.

A turning point came when he attended a meditation retreat for Vietnam veterans led by the renowned Zen monk Thich Nhat Hanh. Here he encountered the Buddhist teachings on meditation and mindfulness, which helped him to stop running from his past and instead confront the pain of his war experiences directly and compassionately. Thomas was eventually ordained as a Zen monk and teacher, and he began making pilgrimages to promote peace and nonviolence in war-scarred places around the world including Bosnia, Auschwitz, Afghanistan, Vietnam, and the Middle East.

At Hell's Gate is Thomas's dramatic coming-of-age story and a spiritual travelogue from the horrors of combat to discovering a spiritual approach to healing violence and ending war from the inside out. In simple and direct language, Thomas shares timeless teachings on healing emotional suffering and offers us practical guidance in using mindfulness and compassion to transform our lives.]]> 168 Claude Anshin Thomas 159030134X Jeri 4 Review TK 4.15 2004 At Hell's Gate: A Soldier's Journey from War to Peace
author: Claude Anshin Thomas
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.15
book published: 2004
rating: 4
read at: 2023/12/28
date added: 2023/12/28
shelves:
review:
Review TK
]]> <![CDATA[No Cure for Being Human: And Other Truths I Need to Hear]]> 56552947 The bestselling author of Everything Happens for a Reason (And Other Lies I've Loved) asks, how do you move forward with a life you didn't choose?

It's hard to give up on the feeling that the life you really want is just out of reach. A beach body by summer. A trip to Disneyland around the corner. A promotion on the horizon. Everyone wants to believe that they are headed toward good, better, best. But what happens when the life you hoped for is put on hold indefinitely?

Kate Bowler believed that life was a series of unlimited choices, until she discovered, at age 35, that her body was wracked with cancer. In No Cure for Being Human, she searches for a way forward as she mines the wisdom (and absurdity) of today's "best life now" advice industry, which insists on exhausting positivity and on trying to convince us that we can out-eat, out-learn, and out-perform our humanness. We are, she finds, as fragile as the day we were born.

With dry wit and unflinching honesty, Kate Bowler grapples with her diagnosis, her ambition, and her faith as she tries to come to terms with her limitations in a culture that says anything is possible. She finds that we need one another if we're going to tell the truth: Life is beautiful and terrible, full of hope and despair and everything in between--and there's no cure for being human.]]> 224 Kate Bowler 0593230779 Jeri 3 pleasure-read
From what I gather, a publisher approached Bowler after she wrote in the NYT about her cancer battle. She thenwrote, "Everything." Also from what I gather, she needed what she earned from "Everything" to pay for her cancer treatments. In "Everything Happens," she wrote about her worry about bankrupting her extended family in order to pay her bills.

From a reader's standpoint, where our reading time is often pretty precious, the only book she really needed to write was "No Cure." Still, from a pragmatic standpoint, she needed the money. And with our era of escalating healthcare costs -- and Dr. Kate Bowler being a religion professor pursuing tenure with no guarantee whether she would be back at Duke -- could you fault her for writing two books instead of one?

Now, to the book.

I can see why an agent would lasso Bowler. She has got quite the gift. She writes in such a wonderful way. She'll get you laughing in one sentence and punches you in the gut with something poignant in the next. Plus, add that she teaches soon-to-be pastors at one of the country's top divinity schools, and you get a perspective that is rich, nuanced, and thought-provoking.

But what really got me was how incredibly attentive she is to the world around her. She finds everyday details to emphasize something much bigger. For example, when Bowler and her husband, Toban, went on a bucket-list trip out West, they discovered a tiny chapel off Route 66 near the Grand Canyon full of graffiti and prayers written on slips of paper tucked into the bricks. It was unlocked and empty. So they walked in.

Here's what she wrote:

**

"Do you think anyone would mind if I added a little something?" I asked quickly.

Toban raised an eyebrow and gestured to the chaotic scrawl around us.

"A moment of privacy then, sir," I answered with a smile, tearing a strip out of my notebook and taking a pen.

I wrote down a phrase, got up on the bench, and stuffed the slip of paper in the wall as high as I could reach.

"What did you decide?" he wondered when we climbed back into the truck.

"It was something Mr. Boothe used to say," I replied. I love thinking asbout him at the chalkboard, goading us into advanced math problems as he publicly suffered from the disease infecting all good teachers –� too much faith in humanity.

Dumo spiro spero, he would say, shaking his head.

While I breathe, I hope.

**

Beautiful, right? I think so. I'd give Bowler's memoir 3 1/2 stars. Yes, it was good. And yes, she took me on a journey with her wit, her talent and her exquisitely funny way she uses our language. But after finishing "Everything Happens" less than two weeks before, I felt like I'd read much of it before.

I'm just glad Dr. Kate Bowler survived. She has much more to accomplish in her young life. When she does, we'll all benefit.]]> 4.11 2021 No Cure for Being Human: And Other Truths I Need to Hear
author: Kate Bowler
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2021
rating: 3
read at: 2023/12/24
date added: 2023/12/24
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
"No Cure for Being Human" is a sequel to "Everything Happens for a Reason." "Everything" left you wondering whether Kate Bowler will survive cancer. "No Cure" answers that question.

From what I gather, a publisher approached Bowler after she wrote in the NYT about her cancer battle. She thenwrote, "Everything." Also from what I gather, she needed what she earned from "Everything" to pay for her cancer treatments. In "Everything Happens," she wrote about her worry about bankrupting her extended family in order to pay her bills.

From a reader's standpoint, where our reading time is often pretty precious, the only book she really needed to write was "No Cure." Still, from a pragmatic standpoint, she needed the money. And with our era of escalating healthcare costs -- and Dr. Kate Bowler being a religion professor pursuing tenure with no guarantee whether she would be back at Duke -- could you fault her for writing two books instead of one?

Now, to the book.

I can see why an agent would lasso Bowler. She has got quite the gift. She writes in such a wonderful way. She'll get you laughing in one sentence and punches you in the gut with something poignant in the next. Plus, add that she teaches soon-to-be pastors at one of the country's top divinity schools, and you get a perspective that is rich, nuanced, and thought-provoking.

But what really got me was how incredibly attentive she is to the world around her. She finds everyday details to emphasize something much bigger. For example, when Bowler and her husband, Toban, went on a bucket-list trip out West, they discovered a tiny chapel off Route 66 near the Grand Canyon full of graffiti and prayers written on slips of paper tucked into the bricks. It was unlocked and empty. So they walked in.

Here's what she wrote:

**

"Do you think anyone would mind if I added a little something?" I asked quickly.

Toban raised an eyebrow and gestured to the chaotic scrawl around us.

"A moment of privacy then, sir," I answered with a smile, tearing a strip out of my notebook and taking a pen.

I wrote down a phrase, got up on the bench, and stuffed the slip of paper in the wall as high as I could reach.

"What did you decide?" he wondered when we climbed back into the truck.

"It was something Mr. Boothe used to say," I replied. I love thinking asbout him at the chalkboard, goading us into advanced math problems as he publicly suffered from the disease infecting all good teachers –� too much faith in humanity.

Dumo spiro spero, he would say, shaking his head.

While I breathe, I hope.

**

Beautiful, right? I think so. I'd give Bowler's memoir 3 1/2 stars. Yes, it was good. And yes, she took me on a journey with her wit, her talent and her exquisitely funny way she uses our language. But after finishing "Everything Happens" less than two weeks before, I felt like I'd read much of it before.

I'm just glad Dr. Kate Bowler survived. She has much more to accomplish in her young life. When she does, we'll all benefit.
]]> <![CDATA[Everything Happens for a Reason: And Other Lies I've Loved]]> 35133923 A divinity professor and young mother with a Stage IV cancer diagnosis explores the pain and joy of living without certainty.

Thirty-five-year-old Kate Bowler was a professor at the school of divinity at Duke, and had finally had a baby with her childhood sweetheart after years of trying, when she began to feel jabbing pains in her stomach. She lost thirty pounds, chugged antacid, and visited doctors for three months before she was finally diagnosed with Stage IV colon cancer.

As she navigates the aftermath of her diagnosis, Kate pulls the reader deeply into her life, which is populated with a colorful, often hilarious collection of friends, pastors, parents, and doctors, and shares her laser-sharp reflections on faith, friendship, love, and death. She wonders why suffering makes her feel like a loser and explores the burden of positivity. Trying to relish the time she still has with her son and husband, she realizes she must change her habit of skipping to the end and planning the next move. A historian of the "American prosperity gospel"--the creed of the mega-churches that promises believers a cure for tragedy, if they just want it badly enough--Bowler finds that, in the wake of her diagnosis, she craves these same "outrageous certainties." She wants to know why it's so hard to surrender control over that which you have no control. She contends with the terrifying fact that, even for her husband and child, she is not the lynchpin of existence, and that even without her, life will go on.

On the page, Kate Bowler is warm, witty, and ruthless, and, like Paul Kalanithi, one of the talented, courageous few who can articulate the grief she feels as she contemplates her own mortality.]]> 178 Kate Bowler 0399592067 Jeri 4 pleasure-read
They came from my friend, Preston. He's a reader, a thinker, a guy who enjoys wrestling with ideas. He's also Methodist minister, the main preacher at the North Carolina university where I work. He and I are the advisors for a campus magazine where students tackle big questions about their faith, their lives, their everything. Meanwhile, Preston and I have tackled these big questions ourselves in our own conversations about life, death, kids and God. So, when Preston hands me two books, I figure I'll give them a look in due time,

Due time came, and I started with Bowler's "Everything Happens For A Reason."

What was weird "Everything" was Preston had filled the book with his own notes. He had underlined words, starred passages, written in the margins and had big Post-it Notes of various colors marking four sections of the book. And when you closed the book, those Post-It Notes looked like sails of yellow, hot pink and Carolina blue. It felt like I was following Preston's intellectual footprints through the entire book. Sure, it made reading "Everything" kinda fun. But Bowler's talent and incisive wit made "Everything" special.

"Everything" is her memoir about her battle with cancer. That could have easily descended into something maudlin. But it didn't in Bowler's adroit hands. Like her popular podcast "Everything Happens," her memoir is laugh-out-loud funny. I mean, Bowler is just funny, and the phrases she comes up make me go, 'What the hell?" Always enjoy that when a writer uses language like a carpenter uses tools. But what really got me were the moments in her book where she unfolds some scene, some sentence or some line that hits you in the heart.

Here's one. It's her meeting with a physician's assistant, a PA, at the cancer clinic.

**
"How are you?" she asks, pressing on my stomach lacerations as I stifle a sharp intake of breath.

"It's hard," I say, pretending to read the posters on the wall to keep myself from choking up.

"Well," she says, getting up and tidying the supplies, "the sooner you get used to the idea of dying the better." I stare at her, but she is zooming around the room and out the door, on to the next unfortunate recipient of her care. I get up and make it out of the cancer clinic before I crumple in a heap on the wooden bench net to the front door.

Sometime later I will meet a woman with my same cancer and my same life -- a husband and a toddler -- and she will say the words I was feeling at that moment:

"Aren't I still standing here, holding my purse?"

"Aren't I still stopping by the store to pick up ingredients for dinner tonight?"

I'm still real, aren't I?
**

I used my own pencil to mark up that section. That scene just hit me. Others did, too. I see other reviewers on GoodReads were much more critical of "Everything." They didn't like Bowler's criticism of doctors or her take on religion. So be it. She's a professor at Duke's Divinity School, and she's a cancer survivor. And it's a memoir for God's sake, and any memoir worthy of ink needs to be a mind dump full of honesty and human frailty.

As for me, I think I'll thank Preston. But I'll tell him, "One book at a time, man!" Now onto "Being Human."]]> 3.77 2018 Everything Happens for a Reason: And Other Lies I've Loved
author: Kate Bowler
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.77
book published: 2018
rating: 4
read at: 2023/12/17
date added: 2023/12/17
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
I'm always leery when someone tells me, "Hey, I got a book for you!" But when someone hands me two books and says, "Hey, let me give you two to read. Here you go!" I usually would stick my hands in my pockets and say, "Ain't no way!" Well, this is what happened with two of Kate Bowler's books, "Everything Happens For A Reason" from 2018 and her follow-up in 2021 "No Cure For Being Human."

They came from my friend, Preston. He's a reader, a thinker, a guy who enjoys wrestling with ideas. He's also Methodist minister, the main preacher at the North Carolina university where I work. He and I are the advisors for a campus magazine where students tackle big questions about their faith, their lives, their everything. Meanwhile, Preston and I have tackled these big questions ourselves in our own conversations about life, death, kids and God. So, when Preston hands me two books, I figure I'll give them a look in due time,

Due time came, and I started with Bowler's "Everything Happens For A Reason."

What was weird "Everything" was Preston had filled the book with his own notes. He had underlined words, starred passages, written in the margins and had big Post-it Notes of various colors marking four sections of the book. And when you closed the book, those Post-It Notes looked like sails of yellow, hot pink and Carolina blue. It felt like I was following Preston's intellectual footprints through the entire book. Sure, it made reading "Everything" kinda fun. But Bowler's talent and incisive wit made "Everything" special.

"Everything" is her memoir about her battle with cancer. That could have easily descended into something maudlin. But it didn't in Bowler's adroit hands. Like her popular podcast "Everything Happens," her memoir is laugh-out-loud funny. I mean, Bowler is just funny, and the phrases she comes up make me go, 'What the hell?" Always enjoy that when a writer uses language like a carpenter uses tools. But what really got me were the moments in her book where she unfolds some scene, some sentence or some line that hits you in the heart.

Here's one. It's her meeting with a physician's assistant, a PA, at the cancer clinic.

**
"How are you?" she asks, pressing on my stomach lacerations as I stifle a sharp intake of breath.

"It's hard," I say, pretending to read the posters on the wall to keep myself from choking up.

"Well," she says, getting up and tidying the supplies, "the sooner you get used to the idea of dying the better." I stare at her, but she is zooming around the room and out the door, on to the next unfortunate recipient of her care. I get up and make it out of the cancer clinic before I crumple in a heap on the wooden bench net to the front door.

Sometime later I will meet a woman with my same cancer and my same life -- a husband and a toddler -- and she will say the words I was feeling at that moment:

"Aren't I still standing here, holding my purse?"

"Aren't I still stopping by the store to pick up ingredients for dinner tonight?"

I'm still real, aren't I?
**

I used my own pencil to mark up that section. That scene just hit me. Others did, too. I see other reviewers on GoodReads were much more critical of "Everything." They didn't like Bowler's criticism of doctors or her take on religion. So be it. She's a professor at Duke's Divinity School, and she's a cancer survivor. And it's a memoir for God's sake, and any memoir worthy of ink needs to be a mind dump full of honesty and human frailty.

As for me, I think I'll thank Preston. But I'll tell him, "One book at a time, man!" Now onto "Being Human."
]]> <![CDATA[You Belong: A Call for Connection]]> 48836858 From much-admired meditation expert and Western Buddhist thought leader, You Belong is a social and spiritual call to action, exploring our tangled relationship with belonging, connection, and each other

To belong is to experience joy and freedom in any moment: to feel pleasure, dance in public, accept death, forgive what seems unforgiveable, and extend kindness to yourself and others (note: sometimes what’s kind looks fierce). Even in these times of polarization and planetary crisis, belonging is possible. In fact, belonging is our only way forward. Full of practical wisdom and profound revelations, YOU BELONG makes a winning case for resisting the forces that demand separation and reclaiming the connection—and belonging—that have been ours all along.]]> 256 Sebene Selassie 0062940651 Jeri 3 pleasure-read
I heard her interviewed on a recent episode of Dan Harris' podcast "Ten Percent Happier," one of my must-listens every week. She was funny, insightful, and she calls herself a "nerby black immigrant tomboy buddhist weirdo." I was like, 'What?' So, when she mentioned her book, "You Belong," I thought I'd be like Philip.

In "You Belong," Selassie uses her whole life as a lens to look at how Buddhism and meditation has transformed her life. And it has. She has studied Buddhism for more than 30 years, and she's been a meditation teacher for more than a decade. Meanwhile, she teaches worships and leads retreats everywhere. She digs into all that "You Belong." She shares stories from her own life and what she's seen and felt. She also gives practical tips on meditation and unveils her own revelations on life that prompt you to go, "What a minute ... hmmm. OK .... Nice."

Love that in a book. For example, she writes:

"If we decide not to see difference, we end up negating people's stories and their lives. We are human. We use language to understand our reality. Language begets stories. And stories are how we make sense of anything."

Or ...

"We are not practicing to become good meditators. We are practicing to bring more awareness into our life. Staying connected to the body and the ground anchors us in any moment; we feel a sense of belonging."

Or ...

"Making space for ourselves is possible if we prioritize its importance, if we don't get trapped in constantly doing. When I first heard the phrase 'the pathology of productivity' from coach Chela Davison, I recognized in its the anxious fuel for so much in my life. I can still get caught in the loops of grasping connected to worrying, changing, solving, fixing, planning, gettting, achieving, attaining ... Even after weeks of quarantining, there is still the impulse of doing. If I think everything out, every moment of the day -- if I am constantly doing -- everytingh will finally be okay. Besides being impossible, it prevents true connection."

Man, did I pencil in stars and exclamation marks around that passage. That's what I like about buying a book. It turns into an intellectual playground. I write in the margins. I underline sentences. I draw arrows to and from words or phrases. Or simply star it up and write something profound like "Yeah!"

What initially got me interested in "You Belong" was my own personal journey with meditation. Seven years ago, I started meditating 10 minutes every morning after being encouraged by a friend of mine, a wellness director at a North Carolina university. My meditation practice has now turned into a early-morning routine. Has it helped? Hmmmm, yeah.

When I talk to college students every semester about the craft of journalism, I start class by having them do a breathing exercise I discovered through meditation. I use the breathing practice as a way to slow them down so they can focus and understand the importance of plugging in and being present with whoever they interview. They make think it's a bit 'woo-woo.' But it does get their attention and has them paying atetntion.

Now, back to "You Belong."

So, was it worth the read? Yeah. I'd give it 3 1/2 stars. She got a bit lost in the weeds at times in her storytelling. Yet, the gems I found were worth it. All you have to do is look at my copy. It is all kind of marked up.]]> 4.28 2020 You Belong: A Call for Connection
author: Sebene Selassie
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.28
book published: 2020
rating: 3
read at: 2023/12/10
date added: 2023/12/12
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
I channeled my friend Philip with Sebene Selassie's "You Belong." Philip is a retired high school teacher, and he's mentioned to me he buys books to support the author. But he also buys books that really stoke his curiosity. And for me, Selassie's book fit that bill.

I heard her interviewed on a recent episode of Dan Harris' podcast "Ten Percent Happier," one of my must-listens every week. She was funny, insightful, and she calls herself a "nerby black immigrant tomboy buddhist weirdo." I was like, 'What?' So, when she mentioned her book, "You Belong," I thought I'd be like Philip.

In "You Belong," Selassie uses her whole life as a lens to look at how Buddhism and meditation has transformed her life. And it has. She has studied Buddhism for more than 30 years, and she's been a meditation teacher for more than a decade. Meanwhile, she teaches worships and leads retreats everywhere. She digs into all that "You Belong." She shares stories from her own life and what she's seen and felt. She also gives practical tips on meditation and unveils her own revelations on life that prompt you to go, "What a minute ... hmmm. OK .... Nice."

Love that in a book. For example, she writes:

"If we decide not to see difference, we end up negating people's stories and their lives. We are human. We use language to understand our reality. Language begets stories. And stories are how we make sense of anything."

Or ...

"We are not practicing to become good meditators. We are practicing to bring more awareness into our life. Staying connected to the body and the ground anchors us in any moment; we feel a sense of belonging."

Or ...

"Making space for ourselves is possible if we prioritize its importance, if we don't get trapped in constantly doing. When I first heard the phrase 'the pathology of productivity' from coach Chela Davison, I recognized in its the anxious fuel for so much in my life. I can still get caught in the loops of grasping connected to worrying, changing, solving, fixing, planning, gettting, achieving, attaining ... Even after weeks of quarantining, there is still the impulse of doing. If I think everything out, every moment of the day -- if I am constantly doing -- everytingh will finally be okay. Besides being impossible, it prevents true connection."

Man, did I pencil in stars and exclamation marks around that passage. That's what I like about buying a book. It turns into an intellectual playground. I write in the margins. I underline sentences. I draw arrows to and from words or phrases. Or simply star it up and write something profound like "Yeah!"

What initially got me interested in "You Belong" was my own personal journey with meditation. Seven years ago, I started meditating 10 minutes every morning after being encouraged by a friend of mine, a wellness director at a North Carolina university. My meditation practice has now turned into a early-morning routine. Has it helped? Hmmmm, yeah.

When I talk to college students every semester about the craft of journalism, I start class by having them do a breathing exercise I discovered through meditation. I use the breathing practice as a way to slow them down so they can focus and understand the importance of plugging in and being present with whoever they interview. They make think it's a bit 'woo-woo.' But it does get their attention and has them paying atetntion.

Now, back to "You Belong."

So, was it worth the read? Yeah. I'd give it 3 1/2 stars. She got a bit lost in the weeds at times in her storytelling. Yet, the gems I found were worth it. All you have to do is look at my copy. It is all kind of marked up.
]]> <![CDATA[Oh, Didn't They Ramble: Rounder Records and the Transformation of American Roots Music]]> 124458933
For more than fifty years, Rounder has been the world's leading label for folk music of all kinds. David Menconi's book is the label's definitive history, drawing on previously untapped archives and extensive interviews with artists, Rounder staff, and founders Ken Irwin, Marian Leighton Levy, and Bill Nowlin. Rounder's founders blended ingenuity and independence with serendipity and an unfailing belief in the small- d democratic power of music to connect and inspire people, forging creative partnerships that resulted in one of the most eclectic and creative catalogs in the history of recorded music. Placing Rounder in the company of similarly influential labels like Stax, Motown, and Blue Note, this story is destined to delight anyone who cares about the place of music in American culture.]]> 224 David Menconi 1469674998 Jeri 4 pleasure-read
It's full of telling details, warts-and-all details about a quirky little indie record label that grew into something ginormous. Started by three friends, Rounder prided itself as being an "anti-profit collective" that produced music endemic of who we are in America. That included black country blues and string band music to protest music, past and present.

Rounder broke big when it produced George Thorogood and Alison Krauss. But what got me about David's book was its nod to the passion that music sparks in all of us. Rounder was all about that. \ For years, Rounder's headquarters sounds more like a Baja jacket than briefcase business. When Garry West, the founder of Compass Records, here's what he saw. Or at least this is what he told David he saw.

"I would soak in the vibe, a warehouse and the three founders' desks in the same room, stacks of CDs and records everywhere. And I remember thinking, 'Well, this is it.' -- what it's supposed to be like, a community impassioned about music, putting it out there. Sometimes the smallest releases say more about a company's purpose than the large ones do. Some of Rounder's records that are most revered today would never have seen the light of day if they had not been willing to reach into corners. Those are bricks in the wall that play a part of your mission."

Bricks in the wall. Love that. What record companies used to be. Not any longer, it seems. But David brings us back to a time when music was not a commodity. It was more like a movement fueled by what caught our ear. Take company's founders. They called themselves the Rounders. They hitchhiked, traveled to festivals and sold their records out of the trunk of their car. Meanwhile, they kept their antennas tuned to music, any kind of music, that moved them in the best of ways. And they did that for nearly a half century. How much fun is that?

David Menconi captures the why and the how behind all that, and he delivers a make-a-difference book about one of the most influential indie record labels in the world. A must read for any die-hard music fan who sees music festivals as a rite of passage where passion lives.]]> 4.18 Oh, Didn't They Ramble: Rounder Records and the Transformation of American Roots Music
author: David Menconi
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.18
book published:
rating: 4
read at: 2023/11/08
date added: 2023/11/21
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
I always saw David Menconi as one of the best music writers in the country. When he wrote for the News & Observer in Raleigh, NC, I always made sure to read everything he wrote. He possessed an ocean-deep knowledge of music, particularly music that sprang from the Old North State, and he didn't pull punches. Did love that. See, he never wrote like a fan boy. He wrote like a journalist, and that's why his book on Rounder Records is such a joy to read.

It's full of telling details, warts-and-all details about a quirky little indie record label that grew into something ginormous. Started by three friends, Rounder prided itself as being an "anti-profit collective" that produced music endemic of who we are in America. That included black country blues and string band music to protest music, past and present.

Rounder broke big when it produced George Thorogood and Alison Krauss. But what got me about David's book was its nod to the passion that music sparks in all of us. Rounder was all about that. \ For years, Rounder's headquarters sounds more like a Baja jacket than briefcase business. When Garry West, the founder of Compass Records, here's what he saw. Or at least this is what he told David he saw.

"I would soak in the vibe, a warehouse and the three founders' desks in the same room, stacks of CDs and records everywhere. And I remember thinking, 'Well, this is it.' -- what it's supposed to be like, a community impassioned about music, putting it out there. Sometimes the smallest releases say more about a company's purpose than the large ones do. Some of Rounder's records that are most revered today would never have seen the light of day if they had not been willing to reach into corners. Those are bricks in the wall that play a part of your mission."

Bricks in the wall. Love that. What record companies used to be. Not any longer, it seems. But David brings us back to a time when music was not a commodity. It was more like a movement fueled by what caught our ear. Take company's founders. They called themselves the Rounders. They hitchhiked, traveled to festivals and sold their records out of the trunk of their car. Meanwhile, they kept their antennas tuned to music, any kind of music, that moved them in the best of ways. And they did that for nearly a half century. How much fun is that?

David Menconi captures the why and the how behind all that, and he delivers a make-a-difference book about one of the most influential indie record labels in the world. A must read for any die-hard music fan who sees music festivals as a rite of passage where passion lives.
]]> Beowulf 41940267 Beowulf by the author of The Mere Wife.

Nearly twenty years after Seamus Heaney’s translation of Beowulf � and fifty years after the translation that continues to torment high-school students around the world � there is a radical new verse translation of the epic poem by Maria Dahvana Headley, which brings to light elements never before translated into English.

A man seeks to prove himself as a hero. A monster seeks silence in his territory. A warrior seeks to avenge her murdered son. A dragon ends it all. These familiar components of the epic poem are seen with a novelist’s eye toward gender, genre, and history. Beowulf has always been a tale of entitlement and encroachment � of powerful men seeking to become more powerful and one woman seeking justice for her child � but this version brings new context to an old story. While crafting her contemporary adaptation, Headley unearthed significant shifts lost over centuries of translation; her Beowulf is one for the twenty-first century.]]> 140 Unknown 0374110034 Jeri 4 argosy-book-group 4.10 1000 Beowulf
author: Unknown
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.10
book published: 1000
rating: 4
read at: 2020/10/10
date added: 2023/10/27
shelves: argosy-book-group
review:

]]> Flags on the Bayou 63910381 New York Times-bestselling author James Lee Burke comes a novel set in Civil War-era Louisiana as the South transforms and a brilliant cast of characters � enslaved and free women, plantation gentry, and battle-weary Confederate and Union soldiers � are caught in the maelstrom

In the fall of 1863, the Union army is in control of the Mississippi river. Much of Louisiana, including New Orleans and Baton Rouge, is occupied. The Confederate army is in disarray, corrupt structures are falling apart, and enslaved men and women are beginning to glimpse freedom.

When Hannah Laveau, a formerly enslaved woman working on the Lufkin plantation, is accused of murder, she goes on the run with Florence Milton, an abolitionist schoolteacher, dodging the local constable and the slavecatchers that prowl the bayous. Wade Lufkin, haunted by what he observed—and did—as a surgeon on the battlefield, has returned to his uncle’s plantation to convalesce, where he becomes enraptured by Hannah. Flags on the Bayou is an engaging, action-packed narrative that includes a duel that ends in disaster, a brutal encounter with the local Union commander, repeated skirmishes with Confederate irregulars led by a diseased and probably deranged colonel, and a powerful story of love blossoming between an unlikely pair. As the story unfolds, it illuminates a past that reflects our present in sharp relief.]]> 310 James Lee Burke 0802161693 Jeri 4 pleasure-read
So, is it his best? I don't know. But I'd put it up there near the top.At age 86, JLB is still trying to his craft as much as he can to see where he can go. He's just another example of what I've heard often: Writers never retire. ]]> 3.93 2023 Flags on the Bayou
author: James Lee Burke
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.93
book published: 2023
rating: 4
read at: 2023/10/14
date added: 2023/10/16
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
I first discovered JLB in 1993 when I read "In The Electric Mist with Confederate Dead." I picked it up because I was wandering through the shelves of our local library, saw the book's title on the spine, and thought, "Hmmm. What is that?" Since then, I've more than a dozen of his 40-some titles. JLB never disappoints. He can turn sentences into poetry where the landscape seems to ooze from the page. His latest, "Flags on the Bayou" is his first attempt, he says, at a historical novel. He even writes: "I consider 'Flags on the Bayou" my best work." That's a mighty tall claim. It was good, but what struck me is how he used what I've Faulkner and a few other authors do. He wrote each chapter in the voice of a different character and used their point-of-view to push the narrative forward. JLB didn't do a Faulkner in which he wrote in a voice of a character that is hard to understand. This was much easier, even when he wrote in the voice of two female slaves, a female abolitionist from New England and crazed renegade soldier battling syphilis.

So, is it his best? I don't know. But I'd put it up there near the top.At age 86, JLB is still trying to his craft as much as he can to see where he can go. He's just another example of what I've heard often: Writers never retire.
]]> <![CDATA[Lessons from the Hanoi Hilton: Six Characteristics of High-Performance Teams]]> 16237911 Originally intending their book to focus on Stockdale's leadership style, the authors found that his approach toward completing a mission was to assure that it could be accomplished without him. Stockdale, they explain, had created a mission-centric organization, not a leader-centric organization. He had understood that a truly sustainable culture must not be dependent on a single individual.
At one level, this book is a business school case study. It is also an examination of how leadership and organizational principles employed in the crucible of a Hanoi prison align with today's sports psychology and modern psychological theories and therapies, as well as the training principles used by Olympic athletes and Navy SEALs. Any group willing to apply these principles can move their mission forward and create a culture with staying power--one that outlives individual members.]]> 176 Peter Fretwell 1612512178 Jeri 4 pleasure-read Review TK 4.11 2013 Lessons from the Hanoi Hilton: Six Characteristics of High-Performance Teams
author: Peter Fretwell
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2013
rating: 4
read at: 2023/09/28
date added: 2023/09/28
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
Review TK
]]> <![CDATA[Reflections on Captivity: A Tapestry of Stories by a Vietnam War POW]]> 60612243
​This book recounts difficult times but focuses more on the positive aspects� I—the humor, creativity, friendships, courage, and leadership of an amazing group of Americans and how they helped each other survive and even thrive. These vignettes demonstrate how the human mind, body, and spirit can adapt and find meaning in life in the most challenging circumstances. There are powerful lessons learned from this complex experience that continue to guide the author's life to this day. Despite hardship, suffering, and long separation, Halyburton strongly believes one's quality of life is determined more by choices made than by circumstances, and the most liberating choice we can make is to forgive.�

Reflections on Captivity furthers the reader's understanding about the nature of captivity, race relations, human relations, aspects of the air war against North Vietnam, and highlights the importance of leadership, ethics, and devotion to duty in difficult times.]]> 206 Porter Alexander Halyburton 1682478440 Jeri 3 pleasure-read Review TK 4.30 Reflections on Captivity: A Tapestry of Stories by a Vietnam War POW
author: Porter Alexander Halyburton
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.30
book published:
rating: 3
read at: 2023/06/20
date added: 2023/09/15
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
Review TK
]]> <![CDATA[The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder]]> 61714633 From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Killers of the Flower Moon, a page-turning story of shipwreck, survival, and savagery, culminating in a court martial that reveals a shocking truth. The powerful narrative reveals the deeper meaning of the events on the Wager, showing that it was not only the captain and crew who ended up on trial, but the very idea of empire.

On January 28, 1742, a ramshackle vessel of patched-together wood and cloth washed up on the coast of Brazil. Inside were thirty emaciated men, barely alive, and they had an extraordinary tale to tell. They were survivors of His Majesty's Ship the Wager, a British vessel that had left England in 1740 on a secret mission during an imperial war with Spain. While the Wager had been chasing a Spanish treasure-filled galleon known as "the prize of all the oceans," it had wrecked on a desolate island off the coast of Patagonia. The men, after being marooned for months and facing starvation, built the flimsy craft and sailed for more than a hundred days, traversing nearly 3,000 miles of storm-wracked seas. They were greeted as heroes.

But then . . . six months later, another, even more decrepit craft landed on the coast of Chile. This boat contained just three castaways, and they told a very different story. The thirty sailors who landed in Brazil were not heroes - they were mutineers. The first group responded with countercharges of their own, of a tyrannical and murderous senior officer and his henchmen. It became clear that while stranded on the island the crew had fallen into anarchy, with warring factions fighting for dominion over the barren wilderness. As accusations of treachery and murder flew, the Admiralty convened a court martial to determine who was telling the truth. The stakes were life-and-death--for whomever the court found guilty could hang.

The Wager is a grand tale of human behavior at the extremes told by one of our greatest nonfiction writers. Grann's recreation of the hidden world on a British warship rivals the work of Patrick O'Brian, his portrayal of the castaways' desperate straits stands up to the classics of survival writing such as The Endurance, and his account of the court martial has the savvy of a Scott Turow thriller. As always with Grann's work, the incredible twists of the narrative hold the reader spellbound.]]> 331 David Grann 0385534264 Jeri 4 argosy-book-group Review TK 4.14 2023 The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder
author: David Grann
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.14
book published: 2023
rating: 4
read at: 2023/09/07
date added: 2023/09/07
shelves: argosy-book-group
review:
Review TK
]]> <![CDATA[The Soul of Baseball: A Road Trip Through Buck O'Neil's America]]> 315783 276 Joe Posnanski 0060854030 Jeri 4 pleasure-read
The structure of this book, which came out in 2007, is pretty simple: A year on the road with baseball legend Buck O'Neil as he barnstorms through America telling stories of the Negro Baseball League. In the hands of Joe Posnanski, an award-winning journalist known as "Joe Po," (yeah, he has a cool nickname, too), "The Soul of Baseball" turns into a book more than about baseball. He uses Buck O'Neil as a metaphor for America, of what was and, maybe, what it needs to be. In the simple, evocative language of a sports columnist, an occupation where Joe Po shined in Kansas City, "The Soul of Baseball" turns ordinary moments into extraordinary scenes that say much about how one beautiful baseball-loving man sees life –� and how to live it.

"The Soul of Baseball" feels a lot like Mitch Albom's "Tuesdays with Morrie." I mean, both of them were sports columnists when they wrote their books. But it's bigger than that. Like "Tuesdays with Morrie," "The Soul of Baseball" is timeless read. It's one of those books where you can read it again and pick up something new. Maybe, a lesson about life. Or maybe the bigotry of Jim Crow America. Or, if you're wonky like me, maybe another amaster-class example how to move the head and the heart with the nuances of narrative journalism.

Take the scene on page 199 that takes place in Atlanta. Here's Joe Po:

**

After the ceremony, the other Negro Leagues players scattered, and Buck went to a suite and sat alone so he could watch the game quietly. Every so often, someone wandered up to this table and asked him for an autograph or a story. He obliged. Buck looked at peace. He said: "This was a good day."

He looked around the room and said, "Is there anything sweet in this suite?"

The young woman who worked for the Braves walked over, gave her most alluring smile and said, "What did you have in mind, Buck?"

He smiled and said, "Oh, Lord, I want something that won't kill me. How about a cookie?'

Buck got four or five cookies. He ate one and wrapped the others. He headed for the exit. As he passed the young woman who worked for the Braves, Buck said, "I'm sure I will see you again."

"I love the way you say that," she said. "You are so filled with hope."

And Buck asked, "What else is there in the world?"

**

Nice. Love this book. Thanks, Sweet Daddy Pop.

]]> 4.36 2007 The Soul of Baseball: A Road Trip Through Buck O'Neil's America
author: Joe Posnanski
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.36
book published: 2007
rating: 4
read at: 2023/08/23
date added: 2023/08/23
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
His name is Ted. He also goes by Sweet Daddy Pop. He's one of my best friends on Earth. He's a big baseball fan. He's coached his sons when they were young, and he's got season tickets to see the favorites in his new hometown. That's the Atlanta Braves. At his house, Sweet Daddy Pop has a whole shelf of books about baseball. When I stopped in to see him a few weeks back, he pored through his bookshelf and pulled out "The Soul of Baseball: A Road Trip Through Buck O'Neil's America." You should read this, he told me. I'm glad I did.

The structure of this book, which came out in 2007, is pretty simple: A year on the road with baseball legend Buck O'Neil as he barnstorms through America telling stories of the Negro Baseball League. In the hands of Joe Posnanski, an award-winning journalist known as "Joe Po," (yeah, he has a cool nickname, too), "The Soul of Baseball" turns into a book more than about baseball. He uses Buck O'Neil as a metaphor for America, of what was and, maybe, what it needs to be. In the simple, evocative language of a sports columnist, an occupation where Joe Po shined in Kansas City, "The Soul of Baseball" turns ordinary moments into extraordinary scenes that say much about how one beautiful baseball-loving man sees life –� and how to live it.

"The Soul of Baseball" feels a lot like Mitch Albom's "Tuesdays with Morrie." I mean, both of them were sports columnists when they wrote their books. But it's bigger than that. Like "Tuesdays with Morrie," "The Soul of Baseball" is timeless read. It's one of those books where you can read it again and pick up something new. Maybe, a lesson about life. Or maybe the bigotry of Jim Crow America. Or, if you're wonky like me, maybe another amaster-class example how to move the head and the heart with the nuances of narrative journalism.

Take the scene on page 199 that takes place in Atlanta. Here's Joe Po:

**

After the ceremony, the other Negro Leagues players scattered, and Buck went to a suite and sat alone so he could watch the game quietly. Every so often, someone wandered up to this table and asked him for an autograph or a story. He obliged. Buck looked at peace. He said: "This was a good day."

He looked around the room and said, "Is there anything sweet in this suite?"

The young woman who worked for the Braves walked over, gave her most alluring smile and said, "What did you have in mind, Buck?"

He smiled and said, "Oh, Lord, I want something that won't kill me. How about a cookie?'

Buck got four or five cookies. He ate one and wrapped the others. He headed for the exit. As he passed the young woman who worked for the Braves, Buck said, "I'm sure I will see you again."

"I love the way you say that," she said. "You are so filled with hope."

And Buck asked, "What else is there in the world?"

**

Nice. Love this book. Thanks, Sweet Daddy Pop.


]]> <![CDATA[This Is How You Lose the Time War]]> 43352954 Burn before reading. Thus begins an unlikely correspondence between two rival agents hellbent on securing the best possible future for their warring factions. Now, what began as a taunt, a battlefield boast, grows into something more. Something epic. Something romantic. Something that could change the past and the future.

Except the discovery of their bond would mean death for each of them. There's still a war going on, after all. And someone has to win that war.]]> 209 Amal El-Mohtar Jeri 3 argosy-book-group
It was love story between two bad-ass female warriors who first tried to kill one another. Then, they fell in love. And the backdrop of their love affair is a dystopian world in the grips of a confusing war that jumps time and space. I'm still trying to wrap my head around it. I never did. But I loved the writing and the book's structure even though the sense of place -- what I see is crucial to any story -- felt as thin as parchment paper. Just no ... there there.

Still, I felt the ingenious storytelling devices used by two storytelling friends, Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone, worked. Why? The structure. Amal and Max wrote in the voices of the two characters, Red and Blue. Red and Blue hunted each other down through these different universes, and they corresponded with one another through love letters discovered in the most ingenious of places. And these love letters were sensual, poignant and just downright poetic. So, it's no wonder I discovered that Amal El-Mohtar is a poet from Canada who has edited since 2006 Goblin Fruit, a poetry quarterly magazine.

Now to one of the letters:

"I want to be a body for you. I want to chase you, find you, I want to be eluded and teased and adored; I want to be defeated and victorious—I want you to cut me, sharpen me. I want to drink tea beside you in ten years or a thousand."

Something, right?

"Time War" reminds me of Anthony Doerr's 2014 "All the Light We Cannot See" in that "Time War" encourages the reader to unravel the intricate literary puzzle Gladstone and E-Mohtar have crafted. But unlike "All the Light," "Time War" doesn't turn place into a character as Doerr did. "All the Light," a stone-cold classic, makes your senses do jumping jacks when it comes to a sense of place. "Time War"? Not so much.

That could be a construct of science fiction, I don't know. I don't read enough sci-fi to understand how a sense of place plays into plot. World construction would be kinda fun, I would think. Overall, though, I enjoyed "Time War." Just not a big fan of closing a book and go "WTF, what was that all about?"

A few of my friends told me, "It's a young person's book." And it could be. Both El-Mohtar and Gladstone are in their late 30s, two Millennials who have written books together before. They co-authored."The Honey Month," a collection of poetry and prose written to the taste of 28 different kinds of honey.

My friends and I are far from Millennials -- and we read bunches of books. Like me, they say the twisting thread of a plot in "Time War" confused them, too.

So, at least I know I'm not alone.]]> 3.86 2019 This Is How You Lose the Time War
author: Amal El-Mohtar
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2019
rating: 3
read at: 2023/08/09
date added: 2023/08/22
shelves: argosy-book-group
review:
"Time War" was a fascinating read for me.

It was love story between two bad-ass female warriors who first tried to kill one another. Then, they fell in love. And the backdrop of their love affair is a dystopian world in the grips of a confusing war that jumps time and space. I'm still trying to wrap my head around it. I never did. But I loved the writing and the book's structure even though the sense of place -- what I see is crucial to any story -- felt as thin as parchment paper. Just no ... there there.

Still, I felt the ingenious storytelling devices used by two storytelling friends, Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone, worked. Why? The structure. Amal and Max wrote in the voices of the two characters, Red and Blue. Red and Blue hunted each other down through these different universes, and they corresponded with one another through love letters discovered in the most ingenious of places. And these love letters were sensual, poignant and just downright poetic. So, it's no wonder I discovered that Amal El-Mohtar is a poet from Canada who has edited since 2006 Goblin Fruit, a poetry quarterly magazine.

Now to one of the letters:

"I want to be a body for you. I want to chase you, find you, I want to be eluded and teased and adored; I want to be defeated and victorious—I want you to cut me, sharpen me. I want to drink tea beside you in ten years or a thousand."

Something, right?

"Time War" reminds me of Anthony Doerr's 2014 "All the Light We Cannot See" in that "Time War" encourages the reader to unravel the intricate literary puzzle Gladstone and E-Mohtar have crafted. But unlike "All the Light," "Time War" doesn't turn place into a character as Doerr did. "All the Light," a stone-cold classic, makes your senses do jumping jacks when it comes to a sense of place. "Time War"? Not so much.

That could be a construct of science fiction, I don't know. I don't read enough sci-fi to understand how a sense of place plays into plot. World construction would be kinda fun, I would think. Overall, though, I enjoyed "Time War." Just not a big fan of closing a book and go "WTF, what was that all about?"

A few of my friends told me, "It's a young person's book." And it could be. Both El-Mohtar and Gladstone are in their late 30s, two Millennials who have written books together before. They co-authored."The Honey Month," a collection of poetry and prose written to the taste of 28 different kinds of honey.

My friends and I are far from Millennials -- and we read bunches of books. Like me, they say the twisting thread of a plot in "Time War" confused them, too.

So, at least I know I'm not alone.
]]> <![CDATA[Life of the Beloved: Spiritual Living in a Secular World]]> 6151 160 Henri J.M. Nouwen 0824519868 Jeri 4 work-read
"All that came from 'Beloved,'" my friend told me.

Wait a minute. What?

"Beloved," my friend told me. "His book."

So, I was curious. I had heard about Nouwen for years. He was an influential Dutch priest who had written 39 books, and like Franciscan priest Richard Rohr, he had become this respected figure among those see the word "spiritual" more than just an adjective. But I had never read any of Nouwen's book, and "Beloved" was considered classic. So, I picked it up from the local library. It was 149 pages, and I figured it could give me some insight into my social justice friend.

Oh, it did. And then some.

I liked Nouwen's book immediately. It reminded me of one of my favorites –� "Letters to a Young Poet" by Rainer Maria Rilke. Nouwen's "Life of the Beloved" came out in 1992, and like Rilke's book, its style is conversational, written as if a letter to a friend. In Nouwen's case, it was a struggling journalist going through a divorce. In Rilke, it was a struggling young poet trying to find his way. But what got me -- and why I gave "Beloved" four stars -- is that Nouwen writes in a clear-eyed, relatable fashion about how to deal with some big questions about faith. Plus, "Beloved" made me think. I liked that.

What I love about books, any book, is when I find memorable passages that stick in my mind like bubblegum. And "Beloved" was chock-full of passages that made me go, "OK, what now?" With my copy of "Letters to a Young Poet," I filled it with a constellation of notes I wrote in pencil, all starred and underlined. With "Beloved," a library book, I used stickie notes. Lots of stickie notes. Just so many wait-a-minute lines that made me stop and read again. Here are a few:

-- "The deep truth is that our human suffering need not be an obstacle to the joy and peace we so desire, but can become instead, the means to it. The great secret of the spiritual life, the life of the Beloved Sons and Daughters of God, is that everything we live, be it gladness or sadness, joy or pain, health or illness, can all be part of the journey toward the full realization of our humanity."

-- "The world is evil only when you become its slave."

-- "In the house of God there are many mansions. There is a place for everyone –� a unique, special place. Once we deeply trust that we ourselves are precious in God's eyes, we are able to recognize the preciousness of others and their unique places in God's heart."

-- "As I grow older, I discover more and more the greatest gift I have to offer is my own joy of living, my own inner peace, my own silence and solitude, my own sense of well-being."

I've always been leery of diving into books on faith because they just don't connect on anything I feel I can relate to. They're either too highfalutin, too dense, too woo-woo. You know, rainbows and unicorns. "Beloved" was far from that. "Beloved" was like having a deep conversation with a friend you trust.

That ... never gets old.]]> 4.23 1992 Life of the Beloved: Spiritual Living in a Secular World
author: Henri J.M. Nouwen
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.23
book published: 1992
rating: 4
read at: 2023/08/07
date added: 2023/08/18
shelves: work-read
review:
I heard about Henri Nouwen's book from my friend Frank, a retired Presbyterian minister. Frank and I are working on a book together, and he spun a story about how he met Nouwen in the early 1990s. It was during a retreat in DC. Frank and a handful of others sat in a circle for two days, and Nouwen talked to them about the importance of having a calling. At the end of the two days, Frank walked up to Noowen and received a blessing. Or something like that. Basically, Frank told me Nouwen hugged him close and whispered in his ear about following his heart, being blessed and helping others. Nouwen did that with everybody in the circle.

"All that came from 'Beloved,'" my friend told me.

Wait a minute. What?

"Beloved," my friend told me. "His book."

So, I was curious. I had heard about Nouwen for years. He was an influential Dutch priest who had written 39 books, and like Franciscan priest Richard Rohr, he had become this respected figure among those see the word "spiritual" more than just an adjective. But I had never read any of Nouwen's book, and "Beloved" was considered classic. So, I picked it up from the local library. It was 149 pages, and I figured it could give me some insight into my social justice friend.

Oh, it did. And then some.

I liked Nouwen's book immediately. It reminded me of one of my favorites –� "Letters to a Young Poet" by Rainer Maria Rilke. Nouwen's "Life of the Beloved" came out in 1992, and like Rilke's book, its style is conversational, written as if a letter to a friend. In Nouwen's case, it was a struggling journalist going through a divorce. In Rilke, it was a struggling young poet trying to find his way. But what got me -- and why I gave "Beloved" four stars -- is that Nouwen writes in a clear-eyed, relatable fashion about how to deal with some big questions about faith. Plus, "Beloved" made me think. I liked that.

What I love about books, any book, is when I find memorable passages that stick in my mind like bubblegum. And "Beloved" was chock-full of passages that made me go, "OK, what now?" With my copy of "Letters to a Young Poet," I filled it with a constellation of notes I wrote in pencil, all starred and underlined. With "Beloved," a library book, I used stickie notes. Lots of stickie notes. Just so many wait-a-minute lines that made me stop and read again. Here are a few:

-- "The deep truth is that our human suffering need not be an obstacle to the joy and peace we so desire, but can become instead, the means to it. The great secret of the spiritual life, the life of the Beloved Sons and Daughters of God, is that everything we live, be it gladness or sadness, joy or pain, health or illness, can all be part of the journey toward the full realization of our humanity."

-- "The world is evil only when you become its slave."

-- "In the house of God there are many mansions. There is a place for everyone –� a unique, special place. Once we deeply trust that we ourselves are precious in God's eyes, we are able to recognize the preciousness of others and their unique places in God's heart."

-- "As I grow older, I discover more and more the greatest gift I have to offer is my own joy of living, my own inner peace, my own silence and solitude, my own sense of well-being."

I've always been leery of diving into books on faith because they just don't connect on anything I feel I can relate to. They're either too highfalutin, too dense, too woo-woo. You know, rainbows and unicorns. "Beloved" was far from that. "Beloved" was like having a deep conversation with a friend you trust.

That ... never gets old.
]]> <![CDATA[South to America: A Journey Below the Mason Dixon to Understand the Soul of a Nation]]> 55276620
We all think we know the South. Even those who have never lived there can rattle off a list of signifiers: the Civil War, Gone with the Wind, the Ku Klux Klan, plantations, football, Jim Crow, slavery. But the idiosyncrasies, dispositions, and habits of the region are stranger and more complex than much of the country tends to acknowledge. In South to America, Imani Perry shows that the meaning of American is inextricably linked with the South, and that our understanding of its history and culture is the key to understanding the nation as a whole.

This is the story of a Black woman and native Alabaman returning to the region she has always called home and considering it with fresh eyes. Her journey is full of detours, deep dives, and surprising encounters with places and people. She renders Southerners from all walks of life with sensitivity and honesty, sharing her thoughts about a troubling history and the ritual humiliations and joys that characterize so much of Southern life.

Weaving together stories of immigrant communities, contemporary artists, exploitative opportunists, enslaved peoples, unsung heroes, her own ancestors, and her lived experiences, Imani Perry crafts a tapestry unlike any other. With uncommon insight and breathtaking clarity, South to America offers an assertion that if we want to build a more humane future for the United States, we must center our concern below the Mason-Dixon Line.]]> 410 Imani Perry 0062977407 Jeri 3 pleasure-read
Alright!, I thought. I knew of her past work, and as a professor of African-American Studies at Princeton, I knew she could bring it. So, I grabbed my own copy of "South to America" because I knew I would be writing in the margins and starring passages because I assumed it would be quite the read. It was. And ... it wasn't.

Perry's book is quite ambitious. It's part travelogue, part memoir, part essay. And with her incisive intellect and her deft hand at weaving scenes into a compelling narrative, she started out strong. I loved where she went, and like the talented professor she is, she introduced me to the savage subtleness of the region we both call home -- she, Alabama; me, South Carolina. Some things I knew; other things, I didn't. So, her book was definitely what I was looking for. I scribbled in the margins, starred passages and sent some of her observations to my writer friends on FB.

But as I got deeper into "South to America," it began to feel like a car in need of an alignment. It got wobbly and unstructured. It seems to lose its earlier gas -- pun intended –� and with that surprising discovery, my initial excitement in reading "South to America" turned into a chore. I hate when that happens. Ain't no fun.

Clint Smith's recent book, "How the Word Is Passed: A Reckoning with the History of Slavery Across America" executes with aplomb what I believe Perry set out to do. "How the Word Is Passed" is excellent, its structure impeccable, its journalistic sense spot on. I just wish Perry's "South to America" gave me that same feeling. In the end, it didn't.

Still, I'm glad I read it. It's worth your time. especially now.

To me, the hate and racism and bigotry I see around us reminds me of what Flannery O'Connor once said about how we in the South treat our eccentric uncle. Yeah, we don't hide him in the attic. We bring him out in the open into our living room for everyone to see. That's funny. What I see today around us –� the hate, racism, and bigotry that passes for policy and politics -- is not. At all. So, what Perry gives us in "South to America" is knowledge. And armed with that knowledge, we know what we can do with what we see.

Fight it. In every way possible.]]> 3.96 2022 South to America: A Journey Below the Mason Dixon to Understand the Soul of a Nation
author: Imani Perry
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.96
book published: 2022
rating: 3
read at: 2023/07/21
date added: 2023/07/30
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
Imani Perry had me hooked with her title: "South to America: A Journey Below the Mason-Dixon to Understand the Soul of a Nation."

Alright!, I thought. I knew of her past work, and as a professor of African-American Studies at Princeton, I knew she could bring it. So, I grabbed my own copy of "South to America" because I knew I would be writing in the margins and starring passages because I assumed it would be quite the read. It was. And ... it wasn't.

Perry's book is quite ambitious. It's part travelogue, part memoir, part essay. And with her incisive intellect and her deft hand at weaving scenes into a compelling narrative, she started out strong. I loved where she went, and like the talented professor she is, she introduced me to the savage subtleness of the region we both call home -- she, Alabama; me, South Carolina. Some things I knew; other things, I didn't. So, her book was definitely what I was looking for. I scribbled in the margins, starred passages and sent some of her observations to my writer friends on FB.

But as I got deeper into "South to America," it began to feel like a car in need of an alignment. It got wobbly and unstructured. It seems to lose its earlier gas -- pun intended –� and with that surprising discovery, my initial excitement in reading "South to America" turned into a chore. I hate when that happens. Ain't no fun.

Clint Smith's recent book, "How the Word Is Passed: A Reckoning with the History of Slavery Across America" executes with aplomb what I believe Perry set out to do. "How the Word Is Passed" is excellent, its structure impeccable, its journalistic sense spot on. I just wish Perry's "South to America" gave me that same feeling. In the end, it didn't.

Still, I'm glad I read it. It's worth your time. especially now.

To me, the hate and racism and bigotry I see around us reminds me of what Flannery O'Connor once said about how we in the South treat our eccentric uncle. Yeah, we don't hide him in the attic. We bring him out in the open into our living room for everyone to see. That's funny. What I see today around us –� the hate, racism, and bigotry that passes for policy and politics -- is not. At all. So, what Perry gives us in "South to America" is knowledge. And armed with that knowledge, we know what we can do with what we see.

Fight it. In every way possible.
]]> The Tender Bar: A Memoir 144977
J.R. Moehringer grew up captivated by a voice. It was the voice of his father, a New York City disc jockey who vanished before J.R. spoke his first word. Sitting on the stoop, pressing an ear to the radio, J.R. would strain to hear in that plummy baritone the secrets of masculinity and identity. Though J.R.'s mother was his world, his rock, he craved something more, something faintly and hauntingly audible only in The Voice.

At eight years old, suddenly unable to find The Voice on the radio, J.R. turned in desperation to the bar on the corner, where he found a rousing chorus of new voices. Cops and poets, bookies and soldiers, movie stars and stumblebums, all sorts of men gathered in the bar to tell their stories and forget their cares. The alphas along the bar—including J.R.'s Uncle Charlie, a Humphrey Bogart look-alike; Colt, a Yogi Bear sound-alike; and Joey D, a softhearted brawler—took J.R. to the beach, to ballgames, and ultimately into their circle. They taught J.R., tended him, and provided a kind of fatherhood-by-committee.

Torn between the stirring example of his mother and the lurid romance of the bar, J.R. tried to forge a self somewhere in the center. But when it was time for J.R. to leave home, the bar became an increasingly seductive sanctuary, a place to return and regroup during his picaresque journeys—from his grandfather's tumbledown house to the hallowed towers and spires of Yale; from his absurd stint selling housewares at Lord & Taylor to his dream job at the New York Times, which became a nightmare when he found himself a faulty cog in a vast machine. Time and again the bar offered shelter from failure, rejection, heartbreak--and eventually from reality.

In the grand tradition of landmark memoirs, The Tender Bar is suspenseful, wrenching, and achingly funny. A classic American story of self-invention and escape, of the fierce love between a single mother and an only son, it's also a moving portrait of one boy's struggle to become a man, and an unforgettable depiction of how men remain, at heart, lost boys.]]> 416 J.R. Moehringer 0786888768 Jeri 4 pleasure-read
He had been hired to be the ghostwriter for memoirs tennis star Andre Agassi, Nike's Phil Knight and more recently Prince Harry. And me? I simply acted as one of the ghostwriters for a university president in North Carolina. So, I read the piece in The New Yorker, and like Moehringer, a longtime journalist like me, had learned through trial and error how a ghostwriter needs to work. But what struck me was that deep well of work came to him because of his 2005 memoir, "The Tender Bar." Agassi read it and loved it. That led to others flocking to hire Moehringer as their ghostwriter. After reading "The Tender Bar," I can see why.

"The Tender Bar" is an enthralling read. What I love is how the bar turns into a character that breathes, laughs, sighs and cries. It does through the characters on every page, and these characters in various ways become the surrogate fathers that Moehringer needs to become the man he needs to be. And "The Tender Bar" is all about how a boy becomes a man. And Moehringer needs it.

His father left him and his mom, and as he grows up, we see him become an emotional mess. He self-medicates with alcohol, and he's as directionless as a spinning weathervane. And yet, as he stumbles through his life, you see on the pages the humanity he encounters. I loved it because I can empathize.

I think it's because Moehringer and I are the same age, and "The Tender Bar" is full of details and scenes I recognize from my own life at that time. Like Moehringer, I was a struggling journalist. And Like Moehringer, I leaned into friends and family for help.

He saw the bar known as Publicans in his hometown of Manhasset as his safe harbor. I saw my hometown of Charleston, S.C., as my safe harbor, a place where I could hold onto the past with a beer -- or three -- in my hand as I tried to figure out my own future.

We've all been there. But Moehringer is our most excellent guide. He put into words how we all feel at that age, particularly men trying to find their way into the world. It's that fog-like sense we grapple with early in life. We try to move from confusion to clarity. To get there, we lean on people we love, we care about, and we want to be with to the very end.

"The Tender Bar" is full of dialogue and scenes and characters that remind me of that. Here's one, from page 203 from the chapter, "Father Amtrack." It's the scene where Moehringer meets a priest on the way back to Yale. Father Amtrack tells Moehringer:

"People just don't understand how many men it takes to build one good man. Next time you're in Manhattan and you see one of those mighty skyscrapers going up, pay attention to how many men are engaged in the enterprise. It takes just as many men to build a sturdy man, son, as it does to build a tower."

True that.]]> 3.96 2005 The Tender Bar: A Memoir
author: J.R. Moehringer
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.96
book published: 2005
rating: 4
read at: 2023/06/11
date added: 2023/06/11
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
It was a piece in The New Yorker recently, headlined "The Ghostwriter," that convinced me to pick up this memoir. A good friend of mine, a Methodist minister, had mentioned The New Yorker piece because I also had begun earning a paycheck like J.R. Moehringer.

He had been hired to be the ghostwriter for memoirs tennis star Andre Agassi, Nike's Phil Knight and more recently Prince Harry. And me? I simply acted as one of the ghostwriters for a university president in North Carolina. So, I read the piece in The New Yorker, and like Moehringer, a longtime journalist like me, had learned through trial and error how a ghostwriter needs to work. But what struck me was that deep well of work came to him because of his 2005 memoir, "The Tender Bar." Agassi read it and loved it. That led to others flocking to hire Moehringer as their ghostwriter. After reading "The Tender Bar," I can see why.

"The Tender Bar" is an enthralling read. What I love is how the bar turns into a character that breathes, laughs, sighs and cries. It does through the characters on every page, and these characters in various ways become the surrogate fathers that Moehringer needs to become the man he needs to be. And "The Tender Bar" is all about how a boy becomes a man. And Moehringer needs it.

His father left him and his mom, and as he grows up, we see him become an emotional mess. He self-medicates with alcohol, and he's as directionless as a spinning weathervane. And yet, as he stumbles through his life, you see on the pages the humanity he encounters. I loved it because I can empathize.

I think it's because Moehringer and I are the same age, and "The Tender Bar" is full of details and scenes I recognize from my own life at that time. Like Moehringer, I was a struggling journalist. And Like Moehringer, I leaned into friends and family for help.

He saw the bar known as Publicans in his hometown of Manhasset as his safe harbor. I saw my hometown of Charleston, S.C., as my safe harbor, a place where I could hold onto the past with a beer -- or three -- in my hand as I tried to figure out my own future.

We've all been there. But Moehringer is our most excellent guide. He put into words how we all feel at that age, particularly men trying to find their way into the world. It's that fog-like sense we grapple with early in life. We try to move from confusion to clarity. To get there, we lean on people we love, we care about, and we want to be with to the very end.

"The Tender Bar" is full of dialogue and scenes and characters that remind me of that. Here's one, from page 203 from the chapter, "Father Amtrack." It's the scene where Moehringer meets a priest on the way back to Yale. Father Amtrack tells Moehringer:

"People just don't understand how many men it takes to build one good man. Next time you're in Manhattan and you see one of those mighty skyscrapers going up, pay attention to how many men are engaged in the enterprise. It takes just as many men to build a sturdy man, son, as it does to build a tower."

True that.
]]> The Trackers 61609871 From the New York Times bestselling author of Cold Mountain and Varina, a stunning new novel that paints a vivid portrait of life in the Great Depression

Hurtling past the downtrodden communities of Depression-era America, painter Val Welch travels westward to the rural town of Dawes, Wyoming. Through a stroke of luck, he's landed a New Deal assignment to create a mural representing the region for their new Post Office.

A wealthy art lover named John Long and his wife Eve have agreed to host Val at their sprawling ranch. Rumors and intrigue surround the couple: Eve left behind an itinerant life riding the rails and singing in a western swing band. Long holds shady political aspirations, but was once a WWI sniper--and his right hand is a mysterious elder cowboy, a vestige of the violent old west. Val quickly finds himself entranced by their lives.

One day, Eve flees home with a valuable painting in tow, and Long recruits Val to hit the road with a mission of tracking her down. Journeying from ramshackle Hoovervilles to San Francisco nightclubs to the swamps of Florida, Val's search for Eve narrows, and he soon turns up secrets that could spark formidable changes for all of them.

In The Trackers, singular American writer Charles Frazier conjures up the lives of everyday people during an extraordinary period of history that bears uncanny resemblance to our own. With the keen perceptions of humanity and transcendent storytelling that have made him beloved for decades, Frazier has created a powerful and timeless new classic.]]> 320 Charles Frazier 0062948083 Jeri 3 argosy-book-group
I've listened to Frazier talk about "The Trackers" on "Southbound," an excellent podcast from the NPR station WFAE in Charlotte, NC. And I listened to him talk about "The Trackers" at Greensboro Bound, the annual literary festival in Greensboro, NC. What struck me about both his interview and his talk was how unassuming he comes across.

He's a former college professor, who speaks in the relaxed accent from his upbringing in western North Carolina. He talks candidly about his creative process. He ain't no crack-of-dawn writer. He procrastinates. He gets up in the morning, does errands, has lunch, goes on a bike ride and about mid-afternoon, he gets antsy. He knows he needs to get to work. He starts writing in the afternoon and goes until 8 or 11. Just depends. Then, he starts all over. I love that story. I mean, here's a guy who took a leap nearly 30 years ago. He left academia, and with the urging of his wife and the help of his friends in Raleigh, NC, he pushed through his own skepticism of being a novelist and worked on "Cold Mountain."

"Cold Mountain" amazed for its details and its tale. It was a true tale taken from Frazier's own family. I would give that book close to five stars. Here, I would give "The Trackers" 3 1/2 stars. It didn't bowl me over like "Cold Mountain." But it kept me coming back day after day, for an hour at a time, to find out what happened next. It was appointment reading. I love that about a good book. "The Trackers" is that.

It's a good tale with flashes of literary excellence. The way Frazier writes about landscape just mesmerizes me. It reminds me of Pat Conroy, and as a guy who grew up amid the sights and smells of South Carolina's Lowcountry, Conroy captured that like nobody else. Frazier does the same with the landscape where he places his characters. It does come alive. For me, it's like staring a Botticelli and getting lost in the colors, the images and how details become metaphors that deliver something bigger, something profound.

Frazier did that here with "The Trackers." That made his story about Val and his odyssey indelible to me.]]> 3.57 2023 The Trackers
author: Charles Frazier
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.57
book published: 2023
rating: 3
read at: 2023/05/21
date added: 2023/05/21
shelves: argosy-book-group
review:
Charles Frazier can certainly weave a tale. "The Trackers," his fifth novel, came from simply looking at a photo nearly a century old of a painter -- might've been two -- on a scaffold and painting a mural. That was it. And from there, he penned a novel during COVID of a mural painter named Val, a twentysomething guy from Virginia, who got the sweet deal through his college art professor of painting a mural in a post office in a dot of a town in Wyoming. From there, Val's story takes off, like being shot from a cannon.

I've listened to Frazier talk about "The Trackers" on "Southbound," an excellent podcast from the NPR station WFAE in Charlotte, NC. And I listened to him talk about "The Trackers" at Greensboro Bound, the annual literary festival in Greensboro, NC. What struck me about both his interview and his talk was how unassuming he comes across.

He's a former college professor, who speaks in the relaxed accent from his upbringing in western North Carolina. He talks candidly about his creative process. He ain't no crack-of-dawn writer. He procrastinates. He gets up in the morning, does errands, has lunch, goes on a bike ride and about mid-afternoon, he gets antsy. He knows he needs to get to work. He starts writing in the afternoon and goes until 8 or 11. Just depends. Then, he starts all over. I love that story. I mean, here's a guy who took a leap nearly 30 years ago. He left academia, and with the urging of his wife and the help of his friends in Raleigh, NC, he pushed through his own skepticism of being a novelist and worked on "Cold Mountain."

"Cold Mountain" amazed for its details and its tale. It was a true tale taken from Frazier's own family. I would give that book close to five stars. Here, I would give "The Trackers" 3 1/2 stars. It didn't bowl me over like "Cold Mountain." But it kept me coming back day after day, for an hour at a time, to find out what happened next. It was appointment reading. I love that about a good book. "The Trackers" is that.

It's a good tale with flashes of literary excellence. The way Frazier writes about landscape just mesmerizes me. It reminds me of Pat Conroy, and as a guy who grew up amid the sights and smells of South Carolina's Lowcountry, Conroy captured that like nobody else. Frazier does the same with the landscape where he places his characters. It does come alive. For me, it's like staring a Botticelli and getting lost in the colors, the images and how details become metaphors that deliver something bigger, something profound.

Frazier did that here with "The Trackers." That made his story about Val and his odyssey indelible to me.
]]> As I Lay Dying 77013 As I Lay Dying is Faulkner’s harrowing account of the Bundren family’s odyssey across the Mississippi countryside to bury Addie, their wife and mother. Narrated in turn by each of the family members -- including Addie herself -- as well as others; the novel ranges in mood, from dark comedy to the deepest pathos. Considered one of the most influential novels in American fiction in structure, style, and drama, As I Lay Dying is a true 20th-century classic.

This edition reproduces the corrected text of As I Lay Dying as established in 1985 by Noel Polk.]]> 288 William Faulkner Jeri 5 argosy-book-group Review TK 3.71 1930 As I Lay Dying
author: William Faulkner
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.71
book published: 1930
rating: 5
read at: 2023/05/07
date added: 2023/05/08
shelves: argosy-book-group
review:
Review TK
]]> <![CDATA[From Strength to Strength: Finding Success, Happiness, and Deep Purpose in the Second Half of Life]]> 58100575
Many of us assume that the more successful we are, the less susceptible we become to the sense of professional and social irrelevance that often accompanies aging. But the truth is, the greater our achievements and our attachment to them, the more we notice our decline, and the more painful it is when it occurs.

What can we do, starting now, to make our older years a time of happiness, purpose, and yes, success?

At the height of his career at the age of 50, Arthur Brooks embarked on a seven-year journey to discover how to transform his future from one of disappointment over waning abilities into an opportunity for progress. From Strength to Strength is the result, a practical roadmap for the rest of your life.

Drawing on social science, philosophy, biography, theology, and eastern wisdom, as well as dozens of interviews with everyday men and women, Brooks shows us that true life success is well within our reach. By refocusing on certain priorities and habits that anyone can learn, such as deep wisdom, detachment from empty rewards, connection and service to others, and spiritual progress, we can set ourselves up for increased happiness.

Read this book and you, too, can go from strength to strength.]]> 270 Arthur C. Brooks 0593191498 Jeri 4 pleasure-read Review TK 3.93 2022 From Strength to Strength: Finding Success, Happiness, and Deep Purpose in the Second Half of Life
author: Arthur C. Brooks
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.93
book published: 2022
rating: 4
read at: 2023/04/16
date added: 2023/04/20
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
Review TK
]]> <![CDATA[The ADHD Effect on Marriage: Understand and Rebuild Your Relationship in Six Steps]]> 8605947 233 Melissa Orlov 1886941971 Jeri 5 pleasure-read 3.91 2010 The ADHD Effect on Marriage: Understand and Rebuild Your Relationship in Six Steps
author: Melissa Orlov
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.91
book published: 2010
rating: 5
read at: 2023/03/10
date added: 2023/04/04
shelves: pleasure-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Dusk, Night, Dawn: On Revival and Courage]]> 55115150 "Anne Lamott is my Oprah." -Chicago Tribune

From the bestselling author of Help, Thanks, Wow comes an inspiring guide to restoring hope and joy in our lives.

In Dusk Night Dawn, Anne Lamott explores the tough questions that many of us grapple with. How can we recapture the confidence we once had as we stumble through the dark times that seem increasingly bleak? As bad news piles up--from climate crises to daily assaults on civility--how can we cope? Where, she asks, "do we start to our world and joy and hope and our faith in life itself back . . . with our sore feet, hearing loss, stiff fingers, poor digestion, stunned minds, broken hearts?"

We begin, Lamott says, by accepting our flaws and embracing our humanity.

Drawing from her own experiences, Lamott shows us the intimate and human ways we can adopt to move through life's dark places and toward the light of hope that still burns ahead for all of us.

As she does in Help, Thanks, Wow and her other bestselling books, Lamott explores the thorny issues of life and faith by breaking them down into manageable, human-sized questions for readers to ponder, in the process showing us how we can amplify life's small moments of joy by staying open to love and connection. As Lamott notes in Dusk Night Dawn, "I got Medicare three days before I got hitched, which sounds like something an old person might do, which does not describe adorably ageless me." Marrying for the first time with a grown son and a grandson, Lamott explains that finding happiness with a partner isn't a function of age or beauty but of outlook and perspective.

Full of the honesty, humor, and humanity that have made Lamott beloved by millions of readers, Dusk Night Dawn is classic Anne Lamott--thoughtful and comic, warm and wise--and further proof that Lamott truly speaks to the better angels in all of us.]]> 224 Anne Lamott 0593189698 Jeri 4 pleasure-read
It basically a series of essays wrapped up in an easy-read of a book. Lamott writes about being in the "third-third" of her life, recently married and dealing with the pandemic and the ominous drum beat of climate change. But like her other books, Lamott writes in a clear-eyed way about universal themes in which we all can relate. And she is funny. I laughed out loud as some sections. But mostly, Lamott prodded me to think. Always good in any book. So many things she wrote stuck with me. Like this:

"So to the younger people who have such fear about the future, I would say that older people have a lot of fear, too, but we know things. Fear is not facts. We have seen life self-correct again and again. Stick around, and against all odds, you will, too. We know that science and love almost always win the day, honest to God. We will march with you, mad and afraid, and help cause a holy communion, and we will be singing."

True. Let us sing.]]> 3.95 2021 Dusk, Night, Dawn: On Revival and Courage
author: Anne Lamott
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.95
book published: 2021
rating: 4
read at: 2023/03/31
date added: 2023/04/04
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
I've always enjoyed Anne Lamott's writing ever since I picked up "Bird by Bird" a lifetime ago. I'd read her "Shitty First Draft" section during my lecture to college journalists for years, and I ended up giving copies of "Bird by Bird" to the college studentsI worked with on their writing. Anyway, I figured "Dusk, Night Dawn: On Revival and Courage" would not disappoint. It did not.

It basically a series of essays wrapped up in an easy-read of a book. Lamott writes about being in the "third-third" of her life, recently married and dealing with the pandemic and the ominous drum beat of climate change. But like her other books, Lamott writes in a clear-eyed way about universal themes in which we all can relate. And she is funny. I laughed out loud as some sections. But mostly, Lamott prodded me to think. Always good in any book. So many things she wrote stuck with me. Like this:

"So to the younger people who have such fear about the future, I would say that older people have a lot of fear, too, but we know things. Fear is not facts. We have seen life self-correct again and again. Stick around, and against all odds, you will, too. We know that science and love almost always win the day, honest to God. We will march with you, mad and afraid, and help cause a holy communion, and we will be singing."

True. Let us sing.
]]> <![CDATA[Between the Listening and the Telling: How Stories Can Save Us]]> 60143370 188 Mark Yaconelli 1506481477 Jeri 4 pleasure-read Review TK 4.27 Between the Listening and the Telling: How Stories Can Save Us
author: Mark Yaconelli
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.27
book published:
rating: 4
read at: 2023/03/16
date added: 2023/03/16
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
Review TK
]]> <![CDATA[Driven to Distraction: Recognizing and Coping with Attention Deficit Disorder from Childhood Through Adulthood]]> 108593 319 Edward M. Hallowell 0684801280 Jeri 4 pleasure-read 4.09 1992 Driven to Distraction: Recognizing and Coping with Attention Deficit Disorder from Childhood Through Adulthood
author: Edward M. Hallowell
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.09
book published: 1992
rating: 4
read at: 2023/02/01
date added: 2023/02/27
shelves: pleasure-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Independence Day: What I Learned About Retirement from Some Who’ve Done It and Some Who Never Will]]> 63354435 256 Steve López 0785290117 Jeri 4 pleasure-read
Then, when I heard on "Fresh Air" talk about his new book, "Independence Day," I knew I'd grab it. Steve Lopez is nearly nine years older than I am, and like so many, I knew I'd be edging toward retirement and I saw it more as distant cliff coming ever closer rather than an upcoming adventure to relish. So, I picked it up.

It's a quick read, and quite honestly, it reads like one long column with end-of-chapter cliffhangers and nice turns of phrase between chunks of useful information. He interviews all kinds of folks, both well-known and anonymous, and he gives us readers a clear-eyed portrait of why he chose to go part-time rather than leave the paper altogether at age 68.

But what makes "Independence Day" entertaining is that as he's edging toward the next chapter of his life, his college-bound daughter is racing toward her own. That dichotomy gives his book a nice structure. Lopez turns what could have been a how-to into a story that has a novel-like flow. He also isn't afraid to lean into his vulnerability, his fear, his sadness of seeing his only daughter, his youngest child, move into a college more than 2,000 miles from his home.

Here's an excerpt that caught my attention: "I did not decide, in the end, that I am the work I do –� it's but one part of my identity and nowhere near as important as my role as husband, father, and friend. Nor did I decide that the world meeds me to keep doing what I do. The world will be just fine when I no longer try to make sense of this or that issue in a mere thousand words or less. Empires will rise and fall without me. The newspaper will survive. Other columnists will fill the need for perspective, compassion, and moral outrage."

True. But Lopez is so talented. I hate to see him leave the trenches. Yet, I so understand. Thousands of journalists like me have left the profession they love because of what they can't control –� the loss of advertising, a nation's lack of attention, an archaic business model, corporate owners more interested in profits than public service, and the plethora of outlets that pass off itself as news. Oh yeah, the cries over "fake news" and "enemy of the people" don't help. And really, I wonder if America cares. I left after 30 years of chasing stories. After nearly a half century of chasing stories, Lopez is edging closer and closer to his own exit.

Despite such gloom-and-doom future of print journalism, Lopez delivers a book that's not a downer. It's pretty damn realistic, and it shouldn't disappoint anyone who like me sees retirement as a cliff coming closer with each passing year. Now, Lopez won't help you jump. But he'll give you things to think about before you get anywhere close to the edge.

And that is a big help. Like any good columnist, Lopez makes you think.]]> 4.00 Independence Day: What I Learned About Retirement from Some Who’ve Done It and Some Who Never Will
author: Steve López
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.00
book published:
rating: 4
read at: 2023/01/18
date added: 2023/01/18
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
When I was a metro columnist for a mid-sized daily in North Carolina, I read Steve Lopez all the time. He was the star columnist for the LA Times, and I always looked for how he structured and told a story.

Then, when I heard on "Fresh Air" talk about his new book, "Independence Day," I knew I'd grab it. Steve Lopez is nearly nine years older than I am, and like so many, I knew I'd be edging toward retirement and I saw it more as distant cliff coming ever closer rather than an upcoming adventure to relish. So, I picked it up.

It's a quick read, and quite honestly, it reads like one long column with end-of-chapter cliffhangers and nice turns of phrase between chunks of useful information. He interviews all kinds of folks, both well-known and anonymous, and he gives us readers a clear-eyed portrait of why he chose to go part-time rather than leave the paper altogether at age 68.

But what makes "Independence Day" entertaining is that as he's edging toward the next chapter of his life, his college-bound daughter is racing toward her own. That dichotomy gives his book a nice structure. Lopez turns what could have been a how-to into a story that has a novel-like flow. He also isn't afraid to lean into his vulnerability, his fear, his sadness of seeing his only daughter, his youngest child, move into a college more than 2,000 miles from his home.

Here's an excerpt that caught my attention: "I did not decide, in the end, that I am the work I do –� it's but one part of my identity and nowhere near as important as my role as husband, father, and friend. Nor did I decide that the world meeds me to keep doing what I do. The world will be just fine when I no longer try to make sense of this or that issue in a mere thousand words or less. Empires will rise and fall without me. The newspaper will survive. Other columnists will fill the need for perspective, compassion, and moral outrage."

True. But Lopez is so talented. I hate to see him leave the trenches. Yet, I so understand. Thousands of journalists like me have left the profession they love because of what they can't control –� the loss of advertising, a nation's lack of attention, an archaic business model, corporate owners more interested in profits than public service, and the plethora of outlets that pass off itself as news. Oh yeah, the cries over "fake news" and "enemy of the people" don't help. And really, I wonder if America cares. I left after 30 years of chasing stories. After nearly a half century of chasing stories, Lopez is edging closer and closer to his own exit.

Despite such gloom-and-doom future of print journalism, Lopez delivers a book that's not a downer. It's pretty damn realistic, and it shouldn't disappoint anyone who like me sees retirement as a cliff coming closer with each passing year. Now, Lopez won't help you jump. But he'll give you things to think about before you get anywhere close to the edge.

And that is a big help. Like any good columnist, Lopez makes you think.
]]> <![CDATA[Breathing Under Water: Spirituality and the Twelve Steps]]> 12217780
The audio edition of this book can be downloaded via]]> 176 Richard Rohr 1616361573 Jeri 5 pleasure-read
I do believe I'll come back to "Breathing Under Water" every year, and I bet I'll pick it up now and again to read a chapter. With this 10th anniversary edition, Anne Lamott pens the foreword. In it, she writes:

"I recommend you read this book with a highlighter pen beside you. You will underline something in every chapter, about powerlessness, the raging ego, hope, surrender, salvation, setbacks, grace, making amends, and opening our hearts to bright cooling ribbons of Cosmic and earthly love –� the very reason we are here."

She's right. I had a pencil with me, and I would underline, star, box and write in the margins on almost every page. It's definitely a book for the soul. It's a quick read. Only 120 pages. But those pages will stick with you long after you put the book down.]]> 4.44 2011 Breathing Under Water: Spirituality and the Twelve Steps
author: Richard Rohr
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.44
book published: 2011
rating: 5
read at: 2023/01/01
date added: 2023/01/01
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
I heard about "Breathing Under Water" on Brene Brown's "Unlocking Us" podcast on Spotify. It was a two-parter and Brown was interviewing Rohr about two of her most favorite books he had written. And he has written lots. Like 60 or so. Anyway, a few years ago, I had read "Falling Upward," Brown's other favorite book. It was a summer read with a crew of us at the university where I work and write. We all went deep, and I enjoyed it much. But I had never read -- or even heard -- about "Breathing Under Water," which originally came out in 2011. On her popular podcast, Brown just gushed about. I mean, gushed. So, I figured, 'Why not?" Give it a read over the winter break, away from assignments and students. So, I got it. And yes, I wasn't disappointed. At all.

I do believe I'll come back to "Breathing Under Water" every year, and I bet I'll pick it up now and again to read a chapter. With this 10th anniversary edition, Anne Lamott pens the foreword. In it, she writes:

"I recommend you read this book with a highlighter pen beside you. You will underline something in every chapter, about powerlessness, the raging ego, hope, surrender, salvation, setbacks, grace, making amends, and opening our hearts to bright cooling ribbons of Cosmic and earthly love –� the very reason we are here."

She's right. I had a pencil with me, and I would underline, star, box and write in the margins on almost every page. It's definitely a book for the soul. It's a quick read. Only 120 pages. But those pages will stick with you long after you put the book down.
]]> I Am the Light of This World 59892264
The searing and unforgettable story of one decision that irrevocably changes the course of a young man’s life.

In the early 1970s, in Stovall, Texas, seventeen-year-old Earl—a loner, dreamer, lover of music and words—meets and is quickly infatuated with Tina, the new girl in town. Tina convinces Earl to drive her to see her mother in Austin, where Earl and Tina are quickly separated. Two days later, Earl is being questioned by the police about Tina’s disappearance and the blood in the trunk of his car. But Earl can’t remember what happened in Austin, and with little support from his working-class family, he is sentenced for a crime he did not commit.

Forty years later, Earl is released into an America so changed that he can barely navigate it. Determined to have the life that was taken from him, he settles in a small town on the Oregon coast and struggles to overcome the emotional toll of incarceration. But just as Earl finds a chance to begin again, his past returns to endanger the new life he’s built.

Steeped in the music and atmosphere of the 1970s, I Am the Light of This World is a gritty, gripping, and gorgeously written story of the impulsive choices of youth, redemption, mercy, and the power of the imagination.]]> 304 Michael Parker 1643751794 Jeri 4 argosy-book-group Review TK 3.60 I Am the Light of This World
author: Michael Parker
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.60
book published:
rating: 4
read at: 2022/12/27
date added: 2022/12/27
shelves: argosy-book-group
review:
Review TK
]]> The Remains of the Day 28921 Librarian's note: See alternate cover edition of ISBN 0571225381 here.

In the summer of 1956, Stevens, a long-serving butler at Darlington Hall, decides to take a motoring trip through the West Country. The six-day excursion becomes a journey into the past of Stevens and England, a past that takes in fascism, two world wars, and an unrealised love between the butler and his housekeeper.]]> 258 Kazuo Ishiguro Jeri 4 argosy-book-group
So, when my book crew recommended reading "The Remains of the Day," I wondered if I would feel the same way. This book, Ishiguro's third, was written in 1989. Did Ishiguro exhibit that same kind of talent 35 years ago? He did. Like "Klara," "Remains" snuck up on me. Ishiguro once again used an unreliable narrator, and you could see the story unfold one way and the narrator seeing something totally different. I wondered where Ishiguro had honed that talent. That's when I found out he longed to be a singer-songwriter when he was a teenager. Now, at 68, he still uses that sleight of hand used often in lyrics to unveil the richness of his stories. Ishiguro says:

"I did take a creative writing course, yeah, 30 years ago. And it was the first one ever in Britain. And the whole point of it was that there was no teaching. It was 12 months in which to discover whether or not one really was a writer. I went there with no great illusions that I was a writer, but when I arrived I was wanting to be a singer-songwriter.

"I think there's a part of me that's always remained a songwriter, even when I'm writing fiction. And I can see there's a big overlap between the songs I was writing when I was young and the stories I went on to write. Many of the key aspects of what you might call my "style" as a novelist, I think, derives from when I was a songwriter."

So, maybe that's why it works, that sleight of hand. I don't know. But it works for me, and it leaves me with a real sense of satisfaction that only good writing can bring.

]]> 4.14 1989 The Remains of the Day
author: Kazuo Ishiguro
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.14
book published: 1989
rating: 4
read at: 2022/12/02
date added: 2022/12/05
shelves: argosy-book-group
review:
Earlier this year, I had read Ishiguro's latest novel "Klara and the Sun," and I remember closing that book and feeling this real sense of satisfaction. It was beautifully written and empathetic in spirit. So simple in plot, yet so rich with emotion. I read that book after hearing the writer Michael Lewis rave about it on a podcast. And when I closed it, I said to myself, "Michael Lewis is right."

So, when my book crew recommended reading "The Remains of the Day," I wondered if I would feel the same way. This book, Ishiguro's third, was written in 1989. Did Ishiguro exhibit that same kind of talent 35 years ago? He did. Like "Klara," "Remains" snuck up on me. Ishiguro once again used an unreliable narrator, and you could see the story unfold one way and the narrator seeing something totally different. I wondered where Ishiguro had honed that talent. That's when I found out he longed to be a singer-songwriter when he was a teenager. Now, at 68, he still uses that sleight of hand used often in lyrics to unveil the richness of his stories. Ishiguro says:

"I did take a creative writing course, yeah, 30 years ago. And it was the first one ever in Britain. And the whole point of it was that there was no teaching. It was 12 months in which to discover whether or not one really was a writer. I went there with no great illusions that I was a writer, but when I arrived I was wanting to be a singer-songwriter.

"I think there's a part of me that's always remained a songwriter, even when I'm writing fiction. And I can see there's a big overlap between the songs I was writing when I was young and the stories I went on to write. Many of the key aspects of what you might call my "style" as a novelist, I think, derives from when I was a songwriter."

So, maybe that's why it works, that sleight of hand. I don't know. But it works for me, and it leaves me with a real sense of satisfaction that only good writing can bring.


]]> <![CDATA[Boom Town: The Fantastical Saga of Oklahoma City, Its Chaotic Founding, Its Apocalyptic Weather, Its Purloined Basketball Team, and the Dream of Becoming a World-class Metropolis]]> 22318476 Award-winning journalist Sam Anderson’s long-awaited debut is a brilliant, kaleidoscopic narrative of Oklahoma City--a great American story of civics, basketball, and destiny.

Oklahoma City was born from chaos. It was founded in a bizarre but momentous "Land Run" in 1889, when thousands of people lined up along the borders of Oklahoma Territory and rushed in at noon to stake their claims. Since then, it has been a city torn between the wild energy that drives its outsized ambitions, and the forces of order that seek sustainable progress. Nowhere was this dynamic better realized than in the drama of the Oklahoma City Thunder basketball team's 2012-13 season, when the Thunder's brilliant general manager, Sam Presti, ignited a firestorm by trading future superstar James Harden just days before the first game. Presti's all-in gamble on "the Process"—the patient, methodical management style that dictated the trade as the team’s best hope for long-term greatness—kicked off a pivotal year in the city's history, one that would include pitched battles over urban planning, a series of cataclysmic tornadoes, and the frenzied hope that an NBA championship might finally deliver the glory of which the city had always dreamed.

Boom Town announces the arrival of an exciting literary voice. Sam Anderson, former book critic for New York magazine and now a staff writer at the New York Times magazine, unfolds an idiosyncratic mix of American history, sports reporting, urban studies, gonzo memoir, and much more to tell the strange but compelling story of an American city whose unique mix of geography and history make it a fascinating microcosm of the democratic experiment. Filled with characters ranging from NBA superstars Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook; to Flaming Lips oddball frontman Wayne Coyne; to legendary Great Plains meteorologist Gary England; to Stanley Draper, Oklahoma City's would-be Robert Moses; to civil rights activist Clara Luper; to the citizens and public servants who survived the notorious 1995 bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah federal building, Boom Town offers a remarkable look at the urban tapestry woven from control and chaos, sports and civics.]]> 428 Sam Anderson 0804137315 Jeri 4 pleasure-read Review TK 4.37 2018 Boom Town: The Fantastical Saga of Oklahoma City, Its Chaotic Founding, Its Apocalyptic Weather, Its Purloined Basketball Team, and the Dream of Becoming a World-class Metropolis
author: Sam Anderson
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.37
book published: 2018
rating: 4
read at: 2022/11/10
date added: 2022/11/10
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
Review TK
]]> Walking with Ghosts 52580371
He reveled in the theatre and poetry of Dublin's streets, populated by characters as eccentric and remarkable as any in fiction, those who spin a yarn with acuity and wit. It was a friend who suggested Byrne join an amateur drama group, a decision that would change his life forever and launch him on an extraordinary forty-year career in film and theatre. Moving between sensual recollection of childhood in a now almost vanished Ireland and reflections on stardom in Hollywood and Broadway, Byrne also courageously recounts his battle with addiction and the ambivalence of fame.

Walking with Ghosts is by turns hilarious and heartbreaking as well as a lyrical homage to the people and landscapes that ultimately shape our destinies.]]> 196 Gabriel Byrne 0802157122 Jeri 4 pleasure-read
A well-read friend of mine, a recently retired high school English teacher, had sent out an email to all of us in Argosy, the name of our Book Club, about how much he enjoyed "Walking with Ghosts." From what I remember, he wrote that it was one of the most engrossing books he's read in a long time. At our last meet-up, I mentioned to him about how his email intrigued me. Without hardly saying a word, he handed me his copy of "Walking With Ghosts." Do love that kind of serendipity.

As soon as I opened it, I knew I'd jump into Byrne's memoir headfirst. He started his book this way:

"How many times have I returned in my dreams to this hill. It is always summer as I look out over the gold and green fields, ditches foaming with hawthorn and lilac, river glinting under the sun like a blade. When I was young, I found sanctuary here and the memory of it deep in my soul ever after has brought me comfort. Once I believed it would never change, but that was before I came to know that all things must. It's a car park now, a sightseers panorama."

Sold.

Byrne's memoir is chock full of passages just like that. After watching "Miller's Crossing" years ago, I knew Byrne can act. But he can do more than become a character. He can create characters on the page in the most telling, and sometimes humorous ways. What a poetic touch he has. He also is unafraid to reveal his vulnerabilities on the page. Some of its gallows humor. But much of it is gripping, especially his chapter about his sister. Just tough stuff.

Sure, the structure of the book is a bit unorthodox. It does jump around. But Byrne parts the curtain to his life and lets us in. Glad he did. It's quite illuminating. ]]> 4.06 2021 Walking with Ghosts
author: Gabriel Byrne
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2021
rating: 4
read at: 2022/09/21
date added: 2022/10/06
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
Gabriel Byrne's memoir. "Walking with Ghosts" really took me by surprise.

A well-read friend of mine, a recently retired high school English teacher, had sent out an email to all of us in Argosy, the name of our Book Club, about how much he enjoyed "Walking with Ghosts." From what I remember, he wrote that it was one of the most engrossing books he's read in a long time. At our last meet-up, I mentioned to him about how his email intrigued me. Without hardly saying a word, he handed me his copy of "Walking With Ghosts." Do love that kind of serendipity.

As soon as I opened it, I knew I'd jump into Byrne's memoir headfirst. He started his book this way:

"How many times have I returned in my dreams to this hill. It is always summer as I look out over the gold and green fields, ditches foaming with hawthorn and lilac, river glinting under the sun like a blade. When I was young, I found sanctuary here and the memory of it deep in my soul ever after has brought me comfort. Once I believed it would never change, but that was before I came to know that all things must. It's a car park now, a sightseers panorama."

Sold.

Byrne's memoir is chock full of passages just like that. After watching "Miller's Crossing" years ago, I knew Byrne can act. But he can do more than become a character. He can create characters on the page in the most telling, and sometimes humorous ways. What a poetic touch he has. He also is unafraid to reveal his vulnerabilities on the page. Some of its gallows humor. But much of it is gripping, especially his chapter about his sister. Just tough stuff.

Sure, the structure of the book is a bit unorthodox. It does jump around. But Byrne parts the curtain to his life and lets us in. Glad he did. It's quite illuminating.
]]> Squeeze Me (Skink #8) 50644565 From the best-selling author of Skinny Dip and Razor Girl, a new novel that captures the Trump era with Hiaasen's inimitable savage humor and wonderful, eccentric characters. A surefire best seller.

Carl Hiaasen's Squeeze Me is set among the landed gentry of Palm Beach. A prominent high-society matron--who happens to be a fierce supporter of the President and founding member of the POTUSSIES--has gone missing at a swank gala. When the wealthy dowager, Kiki Pew Fitzsimmons, is later found dead in a concrete grave, panic and chaos erupt. The President immediately declares that Kiki Pew was the victim of rampaging immigrant hordes. This, as it turns out, is far from the truth. Meanwhile a bizarre discovery in the middle of the road brings the First Lady's motorcade to a grinding halt (followed by some grinding between the First Lady and a lovestruck Secret Service agent). Enter Angie Armstrong, wildlife wrangler extraordinaire, who arrives at her own conclusions after she is summoned to the posh island to deal with a mysterious and impolite influx of huge, hungry pythons . . .

Completely of the moment, full of vim and vigor, and as irreverent as can be, Squeeze Me is pure, unadulterated Hiaasen.]]> 353 Carl Hiaasen Jeri 4 Review TK 4.01 2020 Squeeze Me (Skink #8)
author: Carl Hiaasen
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2022/10/06
date added: 2022/10/06
shelves:
review:
Review TK
]]> The Magic (The Secret, #3) 13237327 One word changes everything... No matter who you are or where you are, no matter what your current circumstances, The Magic is going to change your entire life!

For more than twenty centuries, words within a sacred text have mystified, confused, and been misunderstood by almost all who read them. Only a very few people through history have realized that the words are a riddle, and that once you solve the riddle—once you uncover the mystery—a new world will appear before your eyes.

In The Magic, Rhonda Byrne reveals this life-changing knowledge to the world. Then, on an incredible 28-day journey, she teaches you how to apply this knowledge in your everyday life.]]> 272 Rhonda Byrne 1451673442 Jeri 3 pleasure-read
I wondered if it would be a bit too woo-woo. But it really wasn't. Through its short 28 chapters, "The Magic" can help any reader rewire how they look at the world around you. Essentially, it can help rewire how you think. "The Magic" did that for me. At least a little bit. I became more aware rather than oblivious to the small moments in our lives that shine a light on the humanity and graciousness around us. Moreover, at a time when we live in a chaotic world where the Doomsday Clock feels like it's edging closer to midnight, I found Rhonda Byrne's "The Magic" refreshing. I really did.

Now, I did feel a bit ridiculous grasping a Magic Rock at night and saying, "Thank you" for something that happened that day. I grabbed a shell ... er ... a Magic Shell. But I can't deny that one moment at the end of the day encouraged me to pause for the cause of being more grateful. No harm in that.

Above all, "The Magic" encouraged me to frame my world in gratitude rather than cynicism and used scientific research as well as personal anecdotes to show how it is a much healthier way to live. Now, the big question: Will it make me see the world around me differently and will it encourage me to write a daily gratitude list? We'll see. But I can say this: As a longtime journalist who has covered the worst in people, "The Magic" encouraged me to see the world through a much different lens. ]]> 4.10 2012 The Magic (The Secret, #3)
author: Rhonda Byrne
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.10
book published: 2012
rating: 3
read at: 2022/10/03
date added: 2022/10/06
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
I discovered "The Magic" through a conversation with a friend. I mentioned to her about how I write up a 10-point gratitude list every Friday morning with a good friend of mine. When I mentioned that to her in passing, she told me about "The Magic." She got the recommendation from her therapist, and she really enjoyed it. A few days later, she loaned me her book. So, I thought, "Why not?" And I did.

I wondered if it would be a bit too woo-woo. But it really wasn't. Through its short 28 chapters, "The Magic" can help any reader rewire how they look at the world around you. Essentially, it can help rewire how you think. "The Magic" did that for me. At least a little bit. I became more aware rather than oblivious to the small moments in our lives that shine a light on the humanity and graciousness around us. Moreover, at a time when we live in a chaotic world where the Doomsday Clock feels like it's edging closer to midnight, I found Rhonda Byrne's "The Magic" refreshing. I really did.

Now, I did feel a bit ridiculous grasping a Magic Rock at night and saying, "Thank you" for something that happened that day. I grabbed a shell ... er ... a Magic Shell. But I can't deny that one moment at the end of the day encouraged me to pause for the cause of being more grateful. No harm in that.

Above all, "The Magic" encouraged me to frame my world in gratitude rather than cynicism and used scientific research as well as personal anecdotes to show how it is a much healthier way to live. Now, the big question: Will it make me see the world around me differently and will it encourage me to write a daily gratitude list? We'll see. But I can say this: As a longtime journalist who has covered the worst in people, "The Magic" encouraged me to see the world through a much different lens.
]]> Woe to Live On 399430 Narrator Jake Roedel is in his mid-teens when he joins the First Kansas Irregulars in 1861. During the next few years he sees, and commits, more than his share of Civil War atrocities. Most of the action takes place in Kansas and Missouri between the rebel Irregulars (bushwhackers) and the Union Jayhawkers, with some civilians caught in the crossfire. The studiedly cool Jake experiences loss (the deaths of his best friend, father and comrades) and love (the best friend's "widow"); he also learns about tolerance from his contact with a nobly reserved black Irregular. There's plenty of hard riding, drinking and shooting, most of it leading to bloodshed. Jake's loyalty to the "secesh" cause is unquestioning and doesn't quite gibe with his growing unease amid the gore, or with his departure in the midst of the war for Texas with wife and child. The prose is occasionally rather pretentious, but this is a generally enjoyable coming-of-age novel by the author of Under the Bright Lights.
Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc]]> 214 Daniel Woodrell 0671001361 Jeri 4 argosy-book-group
A few years back, I had been mesmerized by the poetic language of "Winter's Bone" (way before the movie), so when Philip, one of our well-read members of our book club, brought up the excellence of Woodrell's 1987 book about the war being waged in waning years of the Civil War along the border states of Kansas and Missouri, I told myself, "Sure." I asked Philip \ about the read, and his response? "It's a beautiful book."

So right. It reminds me of the violence of Cormac McCarthy's "Blood Meridian." By like McCarthy, Woodrell has a poet's heart and a way to turn a phrase, a sentence, a paragraph to prompt you to read it again. That is what makes reading so much fun.

So, I laid on the couch and read for hours even as clouds parted and the sun came out. I didn't want to leave. I knew I had to finish. It was worth it. So worth it.

Thank you, Philip.]]> 4.18 1987 Woe to Live On
author: Daniel Woodrell
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.18
book published: 1987
rating: 4
read at: 2022/07/30
date added: 2022/08/28
shelves: argosy-book-group
review:
It's been a long while since I've read a book in a day. But I did with Daniel Woodrell's "Woe to Live on." Sure, it was only 214 pages. And I was at the coast of North Carolina, enjoying a four-day respite away from responsibilities and kids. But it was more than that. Way more.

A few years back, I had been mesmerized by the poetic language of "Winter's Bone" (way before the movie), so when Philip, one of our well-read members of our book club, brought up the excellence of Woodrell's 1987 book about the war being waged in waning years of the Civil War along the border states of Kansas and Missouri, I told myself, "Sure." I asked Philip \ about the read, and his response? "It's a beautiful book."

So right. It reminds me of the violence of Cormac McCarthy's "Blood Meridian." By like McCarthy, Woodrell has a poet's heart and a way to turn a phrase, a sentence, a paragraph to prompt you to read it again. That is what makes reading so much fun.

So, I laid on the couch and read for hours even as clouds parted and the sun came out. I didn't want to leave. I knew I had to finish. It was worth it. So worth it.

Thank you, Philip.
]]> <![CDATA[Think Like a Monk: Train Your Mind for Peace and Purpose Every Day]]> 51942513 Jay Shetty, social media superstar and host of the #1 podcast On Purpose, distills the timeless wisdom he learned as a monk into practical steps anyone can take every day to live a less anxious, more meaningful life.

When you think like a monk, you’ll understand:
- How to overcome negativity
- How to stop overthinking
- Why comparison kills love
- How to use your fear
- Why you can’t find happiness by looking for it
- How to learn from everyone you meet
- Why you are not your thoughts
- How to find your purpose
- Why kindness is crucial to success
- And much more...

Shetty grew up in a family where you could become one of three things—a doctor, a lawyer, or a failure. His family was convinced he had chosen option three: instead of attending his college graduation ceremony, he headed to India to become a monk, to meditate every day for four to eight hours, and devote his life to helping others. After three years, one of his teachers told him that he would have more impact on the world if he left the monk’s path to share his experience and wisdom with others. Heavily in debt, and with no recognizable skills on his résumé, he moved back home in north London with his parents.

Shetty reconnected with old school friends—many working for some of the world’s largest corporations—who were experiencing tremendous stress, pressure, and unhappiness, and they invited Shetty to coach them on well-being, purpose, and mindfulness. Since then, Shetty has become one of the world’s most popular influencers. In 2017, he was named in the Forbes magazine 30-under-30 for being a game-changer in the world of media. In 2018, he had the #1 video on Facebook with over 360 million views. His social media following totals over 38 million, he has produced over 400 viral videos which have amassed more than 8 billion views, and his podcast, On Purpose, is consistently ranked the world’s #1 Health and Wellness podcast.

In this inspiring, empowering book, Shetty draws on his time as a monk to show us how we can clear the roadblocks to our potential and power. Combining ancient wisdom and his own rich experiences in the ashram, Think Like a Monk reveals how to overcome negative thoughts and habits, and access the calm and purpose that lie within all of us. He transforms abstract lessons into advice and exercises we can all apply to reduce stress, improve relationships, and give the gifts we find in ourselves to the world. Shetty proves that everyone can—and should—think like a monk.]]> 328 Jay Shetty 1982134488 Jeri 4 pleasure-read
From that "Why not?" question came us listening not only to the Daily Calm, but also to the Daily Jay. Jay Shetty also has a daily seven-minute meditation on the Calm app, and when Katie heard about his 2020 book, "Think Like A Monk," we had another "Why not?" moment. So, we read it to talk about it, and what I found was a book as rich as his meditations.

What I liked about it was that Jay wasn't afraid to show his vulnerabilities and talk about his failures and what he learned from them. So, "Think" is really a combination of a memoir/self-help book, similar to what you find in Sharon Salzberg's 2003 book, "Faith: Trusting Your Own Deepest Experience."

But what got me where the A-Ha moments on the many pages in chapters titled "Fear," "Gratitude," "Purpose" and "Service." Jay researched well and give readers quotes and context that cause you to pause.

Like this quote from Nelson Mandela on page 258: "No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin, or his background, or his religion. People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, then they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite."

Seems so simple right. But why so hard?

These sentiments are what you find throughout "Think." That's why I liked it. It made me think. Not to what's next.

Every Christmas, I give my son and daughter, two college-age kids, books in their stocking. Last year, I gifted them Parker Palmer's "Let Your Life Speak: Listening To The Voice of Vocation." They told me they liked it –� at least that's what they said. This Christmas, I do believe I'm going to gift them "Think." I hope it'll make them think and ponder much. Like this last line in the book:

"To find our way through the universe, we must start by genuinely asking questions. You might travel to a new place or go someplace where no one knows you. Disable your autopilot to see yourself and the world around you with new eyes. Spot, Stop and Swap. Train your mind to observe the forces that influence you, detach you from illusion and false beliefs and continually look for what motivates you and what feels meaningful."

I don't know about you, but I believe that's a good thing.]]> 4.18 2020 Think Like a Monk: Train Your Mind for Peace and Purpose Every Day
author: Jay Shetty
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.18
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2022/08/26
date added: 2022/08/28
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
Her name is Katie. We're former work colleagues and former walk-at-lunch buddies. We're now meditation partners. She's married Millennial, an optimistic woman from upstate New York. And me, I'm simply the married father of two, a cynical Gen X'er from the South. Every morning, for the past few years, she and I have gone back and forth to talk about what we gleaned from the day's Daily Calm meditation on the Calm app. That whole experience sprang from one of our lunch walks. We realized we plug into the same app. So, why not, let's collaborate?

From that "Why not?" question came us listening not only to the Daily Calm, but also to the Daily Jay. Jay Shetty also has a daily seven-minute meditation on the Calm app, and when Katie heard about his 2020 book, "Think Like A Monk," we had another "Why not?" moment. So, we read it to talk about it, and what I found was a book as rich as his meditations.

What I liked about it was that Jay wasn't afraid to show his vulnerabilities and talk about his failures and what he learned from them. So, "Think" is really a combination of a memoir/self-help book, similar to what you find in Sharon Salzberg's 2003 book, "Faith: Trusting Your Own Deepest Experience."

But what got me where the A-Ha moments on the many pages in chapters titled "Fear," "Gratitude," "Purpose" and "Service." Jay researched well and give readers quotes and context that cause you to pause.

Like this quote from Nelson Mandela on page 258: "No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin, or his background, or his religion. People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, then they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite."

Seems so simple right. But why so hard?

These sentiments are what you find throughout "Think." That's why I liked it. It made me think. Not to what's next.

Every Christmas, I give my son and daughter, two college-age kids, books in their stocking. Last year, I gifted them Parker Palmer's "Let Your Life Speak: Listening To The Voice of Vocation." They told me they liked it –� at least that's what they said. This Christmas, I do believe I'm going to gift them "Think." I hope it'll make them think and ponder much. Like this last line in the book:

"To find our way through the universe, we must start by genuinely asking questions. You might travel to a new place or go someplace where no one knows you. Disable your autopilot to see yourself and the world around you with new eyes. Spot, Stop and Swap. Train your mind to observe the forces that influence you, detach you from illusion and false beliefs and continually look for what motivates you and what feels meaningful."

I don't know about you, but I believe that's a good thing.
]]> <![CDATA[Faith: Trusting Your Own Deepest Experience]]> 119827 192 Sharon Salzberg 1573223409 Jeri 4 pleasure-read
Finally, I finally finished "Faith" 13 months later at the most appropriate place –� on a beach looking out at the Atlantic thinking about much and nothing. When I look back at "Faith," I find I've underlined the book everywhere in pencil. Just sentences and whole paragraphs, starred and bracketed with a few words in the margins like "Yes" or "Remember this." "Faith" first came out in 2003, but when I finished it in the summer of 2022, it seems so right, so appropriate. I finished it at a time when the Supreme Court has curtailed our basic rights, our country feels more authoritarian than democratic and our world feels more aflame than ever. So, for me, "Faith" is a book for our time of tumult. Take this passage. Salzberg writes:

"I know that sometimes things are so bad that no matter what practices we do or what medication we take, we can't seem to generate even that small amount of faith we need for inspiration to keep going. Then, if we can stand inside our pain for awhile and wait, over time we may come to also see it as a way into the deepest part of ourselves and then back out into the world, a vehicle for new insight into who we are and how much we need to care for ourselves and one another. If there is nothing we can do right now but wait, then, as T.S. Eliot wrote, "the faith is in the waiting." If we can but wait, we may yet emerge from despair with the same understanding that Zen master Suzuki Roshi expressed: "Sometimes, just to be alive is enough."

Salzberg's "Faith" is full of paragraphs just like that. It reminds me of Pema Chodron's "When Things Fall Apart," a book that helped me immensely in a tough time of my life. Salzberg's "Faith" does the same.

By the way, thanks, Jerry. Great book. Thanks for the suggestion.
]]> 4.02 2002 Faith: Trusting Your Own Deepest Experience
author: Sharon Salzberg
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2002
rating: 4
read at: 2022/07/29
date added: 2022/07/29
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
I was checking out a podcast –� I can't remember which one –� but it was with Jerry Colonna, the former venture capitalist who became a leadership coach, CEO of Reboot Inc and chair of the only Buddhist-inspired university in North America. Anyway, the podcast host asked what books he would recommend, and one of those was Sharon Salzberg's "Faith: Trusting Your Own Deepest Experience." So, I bought it, and with pencil in hand, I would read it during what free time away from work, family and other books I was reading.

Finally, I finally finished "Faith" 13 months later at the most appropriate place –� on a beach looking out at the Atlantic thinking about much and nothing. When I look back at "Faith," I find I've underlined the book everywhere in pencil. Just sentences and whole paragraphs, starred and bracketed with a few words in the margins like "Yes" or "Remember this." "Faith" first came out in 2003, but when I finished it in the summer of 2022, it seems so right, so appropriate. I finished it at a time when the Supreme Court has curtailed our basic rights, our country feels more authoritarian than democratic and our world feels more aflame than ever. So, for me, "Faith" is a book for our time of tumult. Take this passage. Salzberg writes:

"I know that sometimes things are so bad that no matter what practices we do or what medication we take, we can't seem to generate even that small amount of faith we need for inspiration to keep going. Then, if we can stand inside our pain for awhile and wait, over time we may come to also see it as a way into the deepest part of ourselves and then back out into the world, a vehicle for new insight into who we are and how much we need to care for ourselves and one another. If there is nothing we can do right now but wait, then, as T.S. Eliot wrote, "the faith is in the waiting." If we can but wait, we may yet emerge from despair with the same understanding that Zen master Suzuki Roshi expressed: "Sometimes, just to be alive is enough."

Salzberg's "Faith" is full of paragraphs just like that. It reminds me of Pema Chodron's "When Things Fall Apart," a book that helped me immensely in a tough time of my life. Salzberg's "Faith" does the same.

By the way, thanks, Jerry. Great book. Thanks for the suggestion.

]]> <![CDATA[My Year of Rest and Relaxation]]> 44279110
Our narrator should be happy, shouldn’t she? She’s young, thin, pretty, a recent Columbia graduate, works an easy job at a hip art gallery, lives in an apartment on the Upper East Side of Manhattan paid for, like the rest of her needs, by her inheritance. But there is a dark and vacuous hole in her heart, and it isn’t just the loss of her parents, or the way her Wall Street boyfriend treats her, or her sadomasochistic relationship with her best friend, Reva. It’s the year 2000 in a city aglitter with wealth and possibility; what could be so terribly wrong?

My Year of Rest and Relaxation is a powerful answer to that question. Through the story of a year spent under the influence of a truly mad combination of drugs designed to heal our heroine from her alienation from this world, Moshfegh shows us how reasonable, even necessary, alienation can be. Both tender and blackly funny, merciless and compassionate, it is a showcase for the gifts of one of our major writers working at the height of her powers.]]> 289 Ottessa Moshfegh 0525522131 Jeri 3 pleasure-read
At first, I found an unnamed narrator repulsive. She seemingly disregarded what life had given her. She grew up in a wealthy family, earned an art history degree at Columbia and lived in a sweet apartment on Manhattan's Upper East Side. She lived a vacuous life punctuated by pharmaceuticals and sex viewed as exercise rather than intimacy. But I told myself, "C'mon, man. Shelve the Dad Attitude!" So, I zeroed in on the writing and the narrator's acidic take on NYC life at the turn of the 20th century and what I discovered was a captivating take on a twenty-something woman trying to jump-start her life. She lost her parents, she was an orphan and she saw a year-long sleep project as a way to reboot who she was.

What struck me, though, was Moshfegh's writing. She 41, a woman who earned her English degree at Barnard and her MFA at Brown. She is the daughter of musicians, and her take on life has captivated the attention of a generation of young readers. Readers like my daughter.

As our pandemic wanes, I wonder how the narrator's isolation mirrors my daughter's isolation during COVID. She graduated from high school during the fourth month of the pandemic. She finished her senior year in her room. She had no prom, participated in a drive-through graduation and started college in August only to get sent home two weeks in because of a COVID outbreak. She finished her first semester in her room and her second semester in an apartment with her college roommate. So, I see the narrator's cynical take of her life and her move to reboot it through sleep as a mirror to what my daughter and millions of others felt during the isolation brought on by COVID.

My daughter and I will talk about "My Year" soon. Can't wait to hear her take. As for mine, I'm glad I read it. I did grimace. But that's what good writing should do. Introduce you to a life you rarely saw or even imagined. From that, understanding can spring. At least you hope.]]> 3.62 2018 My Year of Rest and Relaxation
author: Ottessa Moshfegh
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.62
book published: 2018
rating: 3
read at: 2022/07/28
date added: 2022/07/28
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
Every summer, my daughter and I do a book read together. She always picks. This summer, she selected Ottessa Moshfegh's 2018 book, "My Year of Rest and Relaxation." So, I dove in. Now, I've been in a book club with a crew of well-read guys for nearly 20 years, and what I love about the book club is that I read things I never would pick up. Sometimes, they work. Sometimes, not. Still, reading is always an act of discovery. And "My Year" is definitely that.

At first, I found an unnamed narrator repulsive. She seemingly disregarded what life had given her. She grew up in a wealthy family, earned an art history degree at Columbia and lived in a sweet apartment on Manhattan's Upper East Side. She lived a vacuous life punctuated by pharmaceuticals and sex viewed as exercise rather than intimacy. But I told myself, "C'mon, man. Shelve the Dad Attitude!" So, I zeroed in on the writing and the narrator's acidic take on NYC life at the turn of the 20th century and what I discovered was a captivating take on a twenty-something woman trying to jump-start her life. She lost her parents, she was an orphan and she saw a year-long sleep project as a way to reboot who she was.

What struck me, though, was Moshfegh's writing. She 41, a woman who earned her English degree at Barnard and her MFA at Brown. She is the daughter of musicians, and her take on life has captivated the attention of a generation of young readers. Readers like my daughter.

As our pandemic wanes, I wonder how the narrator's isolation mirrors my daughter's isolation during COVID. She graduated from high school during the fourth month of the pandemic. She finished her senior year in her room. She had no prom, participated in a drive-through graduation and started college in August only to get sent home two weeks in because of a COVID outbreak. She finished her first semester in her room and her second semester in an apartment with her college roommate. So, I see the narrator's cynical take of her life and her move to reboot it through sleep as a mirror to what my daughter and millions of others felt during the isolation brought on by COVID.

My daughter and I will talk about "My Year" soon. Can't wait to hear her take. As for mine, I'm glad I read it. I did grimace. But that's what good writing should do. Introduce you to a life you rarely saw or even imagined. From that, understanding can spring. At least you hope.
]]> Lost & Found: A Memoir 57800384 Lost & Found, she weaves the story of those relationships into a brilliant exploration of the role that loss and discovery play in all of our lives. The resulting book is part memoir, part guidebook to living in a world that is simultaneously full of wonder and joy and wretchedness and suffering--a world that always demands both our gratitude and our grief. A staff writer at The New Yorker and winner of the Pulitzer Prize, Schulz writes with curiosity, tenderness, erudition, and wit about our finite yet infinitely complicated lives. Lost & Found is an enduring account of love in all its many forms from one of the great writers of our time.]]> 256 Kathryn Schulz 0525512462 Jeri 4 pleasure-read
But when I saw she was coming to my city's annual book festival, Greensboro Bound, I leaped at the chance to see her in May. She didn't disappoint and neither does her book. It reveals in a loving way a treatise on grief and loss. Her love story of finding her wife is wonderful; her grief story about the death of her father is wrenching. Combine that with the way she molds words into poetry and disparate facts into a thought-provoking passages, "Lost & Found" is a delightful read. So much to like here.

Like this: "Life, too, goes by contraries: it is by turns crushing and restorative, busy and boring, awful and absurd and comic and uplifting. We can't get away from this constant amalgamation of feeling, can't strain out the ostensible impurities in pursuit of some imaginary essence, and we shouldn't want to if we could. The world in all its complexity calls on us to respond in kind, so that to be conflicted is not to adulterated; it is to be complete."

And this: "To be happy is to have a lot of hap, that archaic word for luck; our joy, our bliss, is left terrifyingly up to chance."

And of course, this. She ends her memoir with who we are and what we need to be: "Loss is a kind of external conscience, urging us to make better use of our finite days. Our crossing is a brief one, best spent bearing witness to all that we see: honoring what we find noble, tending what we know needs our care, recognizing that we are inseparably connected to all of it, including what is not yet upon us, including what is already gone. We are here to keep watch, not to keep."]]> 4.08 2022 Lost & Found: A Memoir
author: Kathryn Schulz
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.08
book published: 2022
rating: 4
read at: 2022/07/04
date added: 2022/07/04
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
I discovered this book after listening to Dan Harris' podcast, "Ten Percent Happier." What caught my attention is what Dan said about Kathryn. He called her the best writer on the planet, and he would read anything she would write. Some kind of compliment from former broadcaster and excellent interviewer. And during their interview, I was taken by Kathryn's take on grief and love and how she put her marriage and the loss of her father in context with the act of living itself. And man, what an inquisitive mind. So, I came away with a lot of "Hmmm."

But when I saw she was coming to my city's annual book festival, Greensboro Bound, I leaped at the chance to see her in May. She didn't disappoint and neither does her book. It reveals in a loving way a treatise on grief and loss. Her love story of finding her wife is wonderful; her grief story about the death of her father is wrenching. Combine that with the way she molds words into poetry and disparate facts into a thought-provoking passages, "Lost & Found" is a delightful read. So much to like here.

Like this: "Life, too, goes by contraries: it is by turns crushing and restorative, busy and boring, awful and absurd and comic and uplifting. We can't get away from this constant amalgamation of feeling, can't strain out the ostensible impurities in pursuit of some imaginary essence, and we shouldn't want to if we could. The world in all its complexity calls on us to respond in kind, so that to be conflicted is not to adulterated; it is to be complete."

And this: "To be happy is to have a lot of hap, that archaic word for luck; our joy, our bliss, is left terrifyingly up to chance."

And of course, this. She ends her memoir with who we are and what we need to be: "Loss is a kind of external conscience, urging us to make better use of our finite days. Our crossing is a brief one, best spent bearing witness to all that we see: honoring what we find noble, tending what we know needs our care, recognizing that we are inseparably connected to all of it, including what is not yet upon us, including what is already gone. We are here to keep watch, not to keep."
]]> <![CDATA[The Yellow House: Van Gogh, Gauguin, and Nine Turbulent Weeks in Arles]]> 101407 352 Martin Gayford 0316769010 Jeri 4 pleasure-read 3.97 2006 The Yellow House: Van Gogh, Gauguin, and Nine Turbulent Weeks in Arles
author: Martin Gayford
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2006
rating: 4
read at: 2022/05/23
date added: 2022/05/29
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
I picked "The Yellow House" after my wife, Katherine, and I spent a few days in Arles, the very place in France where Van Gogh and Gauguin painted. We had retraced their steps and visited a few places where they had set up an easel to paint. The places were beautiful. But what struck me was the sunshine in that southern corner of France. It was ethereal, almost electric, making everything around it -- houses, streets, rooftops, trees -- just glow. So, when I got back stateside, I researched the best book about those nine weeks in the yellow house Van Gogh rented. That's when I found Martin Gayford's book. Gayford is the chief art critic for Bloomberg Europe, and with his knowledge and skill as a storyteller, he made that time in the late 19th century come alive. Enjoyed it much.
]]> A Moveable Feast 4631 192 Ernest Hemingway Jeri 4 pleasure-read Review TK 4.04 1964 A Moveable Feast
author: Ernest Hemingway
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.04
book published: 1964
rating: 4
read at: 2022/04/22
date added: 2022/04/25
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
Review TK
]]> The Slave 25743 Four years after the Chmielnicki massacres of the seventeenth century, Jacob, a slave and cowherd in a Polish village high in the mountains, falls in love with Wanda, his master's daughter. Even after he is ransomed, he finds he can't live without her, and the two escape together to a distant Jewish community. Racked by his consciousness of sin in taking a Gentile wife and by the difficulties of concealing her identity, Jacob nonetheless stands firm as the violence of the era threatens to destroy the ill-fated couple.
]]> 320 Isaac Bashevis Singer 0374506809 Jeri 4 argosy-book-group Review TK 4.23 1962 The Slave
author: Isaac Bashevis Singer
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.23
book published: 1962
rating: 4
read at: 2022/04/17
date added: 2022/04/25
shelves: argosy-book-group
review:
Review TK
]]> Hell of a Book 55964195 Hell of a Book, an African-American author sets out on a cross-country book tour to promote his bestselling novel. That storyline drives Jason Mott's novel and is the scaffolding of something much larger and more urgent: since his novel also tells the story of Soot, a young Black boy living in a rural town in the recent past, and The Kid, a possibly imaginary child who appears to the author on his tour.

Throughout, these characters' stories build and build and as they converge, they astonish. For while this heartbreaking and magical book entertains and is at once about family, love of parents and children, art, and money, there always is the tragic story of a police shooting playing over and over on the news.

Who has been killed? Who is The Kid? Will the author finish his book tour, and what kind of world will he leave behind? Unforgettably powerful, an electrifying high-wire act, ideal for book clubs, and the book Mott says he has been writing in his head for ten years, Hell of a Book in its final twists truly becomes its title.]]> 323 Jason Mott 059333096X Jeri 3 pleasure-read Review TK 4.00 2021 Hell of a Book
author: Jason Mott
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2021
rating: 3
read at: 2022/03/20
date added: 2022/03/20
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
Review TK
]]> <![CDATA[How the Word Is Passed: A Reckoning with the History of Slavery Across America]]> 55643287 Poet and contributor to The Atlantic Clint Smith’s revealing, contemporary portrait of America as a slave owning nation

Beginning in his own hometown of New Orleans, Clint Smith leads the reader through an unforgettable tour of monuments and landmarks-those that are honest about the past and those that are not-that offer an intergenerational story of how slavery has been central in shaping our nation's collective history, and ourselves.

It is the story of the Monticello Plantation in Virginia, the estate where Thomas Jefferson wrote letters espousing the urgent need for liberty while enslaving over 400 people on the premises. It is the story of the Whitney Plantation, one of the only former plantations devoted to preserving the experience of the enslaved people whose lives and work sustained it. It is the story of Angola Prison in Louisiana, a former plantation named for the country from which most of its enslaved people arrived and which has since become one of the most gruesome maximum-security prisons in the world. And it is the story of Blandford Cemetery, the final resting place of tens of thousands of Confederate soldiers.

In a deeply researched and transporting exploration of the legacy of slavery and its imprint on centuries of American history, How the Word Is Passed illustrates how some of our country's most essential stories are hidden in plain view-whether in places we might drive by on our way to work, holidays such as Juneteenth, or entire neighborhoods—like downtown Manhattan—on which the brutal history of the trade in enslaved men, women and children has been deeply imprinted.

Informed by scholarship and brought alive by the story of people living today, Clint Smith’s debut work of nonfiction is a landmark work of reflection and insight that offers a new understanding of the hopeful role that memory and history can play in understanding our country.]]> 336 Clint Smith 0316492930 Jeri 5 pleasure-read
Every Sunday after church, my dad would drive home via The Battery, the beautiful waterfront that bordered the Charleston harbor. As families and other folks walked beneath the sprawling oaks, I'd see Fort Sumter on one side and the big Confederate cannons on the other side, and as that scene passed by my backseat window, I'd think of it as simply a quaint tableau of a landmark moment in our city's collective past.


On many Saturday afternoons in the fall, I'd join my dad for football games at The Citadel. We'd be in the stands, eating roasted peanuts out of a brown paper bag, and hear the song, "Dixie" played after every TD scored by the Bulldogs. Didn't think anything of it.

I had a front-row seat for school integration in elementary school. Loads of Black kids were bused to our school from the other side of town. We learned together, played together and we survived. For the life of me, a kid in his single digits, I couldn't understand the hullabaloo of all those white parents raising such a stink about Black kids getting bused to our school.

As a teenager, I played almost every Sunday afternoon at a gym in downtown Charleston. It belonged to the church I attended, and it sat across the street from the largest slave market in America. Again, never really gave it a thought. That is until by good friend, Chris, an All-State point guard on my high school team, came to play.

When we parked, he looked across the street and pointed out the infamous landmark. "Your gym is across the street from the slave market," he said. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath and walked inside. He never said another word. And he never played at our church's gym again. Chris was Black.

I saw those scenes and sounds from my youth -- the cannons on The Battery, the song "Dixie" and the slave market -- as historical markers to a racist past that I thought was behind us. I grew up Southern Baptist, intoxicated by this Kumbaya idea I had of our community. Whenever racism raised its ugly head in some form, I'd tell myself, "Why can't we all just get along?"

How naive I was.

As I look back now, I see how complicit I was. I didn't do enough or say enough growing up in the Cradle of the Confederacy. I never thought about it enough back then, but the color of my skin gave me a pass against the slights and outright atrocities people of color faced all too often. I was a white middle-class Southerner, protected and privileged, and growing up, I saw slavery as simply a chapter in a history book rather than the psychological yoke around the necks of Black America.

I did shed my blindness. As a journalist for nearly 30 years, with nearly all that time chasing stories in the South, I saw up-close the systemic racism around me and worked hard to write about people of color in an authentic way. I saw my job as a way to dismantle stereotypes and show the community through the written word a more nuanced view of the community that, like every Southern city, lived on the other side of the tracks.

But with the rise of the "Black Lives Matter" movement, I found my education of the Black experience in America wanting. So, I began to seek out. I read, listened and listened some more. I boned up on what had been invisible to me. I was never taught. So, I taught myself.

Over the past two years, I've read much, and I've learned much. But I do believe the best book I've read during that time is Clint Smith's "How the Word Is Passed: A Reckoning with the History of Slavery Across America."

I discovered it last year through an episode of "Fresh Air" when Terri Gross interviewed Smith. He's a poet, an educator, a writer with The Atlantic, and I was taken by the passages he read from his book. You could hear the rhythm of the language in the sentences he read. I remember being taken by Kevin Powers' "Yellow Birds." He was a poet, too. And a war veteran. He used his talent with language to bring out the beautiful, wrenching tale about veterans returning from America's most recent war. I felt Smith would do the same with "How the Word." And man, he did.

So many lines and paragraphs I found were like music on the page. Matter of fact, in a lecture to college journalism class a few weeks ago, I read a passage from "How the Word" to show young writers how landscape and weather can become characters in your prose.

Then there is this line when Smith talked about his grandmother. He wrote: "Her voice is the front porch of a home with everyone you love waiting inside." Love that line.

But his book is more than just lines of beautiful language. There is a righteousness to it. You find that on almost every page.

In "How the Word," Smith becomes a travel writer and takes us to significant places in slavery's past. Through his own observations, your eyes become his eyes. And from that, you see things and read things that should shake you awake from any benign ignorance you may have. At least, that's what it did for me.

I chalk up Smith's "How The Word" as an important book to read at this critical juncture in our history. We all hear so much today about white politicians and white parents pushing to educate kids on a more sanitized version of history. I call bullshit. If we do, we gain nothing except an ignorant populace. Like Heather McGhee's "The Sum of Us: What Racism Costs Everyone and How We Can Prosper Together," 'How the Word" gives you what I see is so necessary -- a more nuanced look at our history that I hope will help move us forward as a nation.

That is, if that can happen.

In the third to last paragraph in the book, Smith writes: "In order for our country to collectively move forward, it is not enough to have a patchwork of places that are honest about this history while being surrounded by other spaces that undermine it. It must be a collective endeavor to learn and confront the story of slavery and how it has shaped the world we live in today."

For the last sentence in his book, Smith adds this: "At some point, it is no longer a question of whether we can learn this history, but whether we have the collective will to reckon with it."

True.]]> 4.71 2021 How the Word Is Passed: A Reckoning with the History of Slavery Across America
author: Clint Smith
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.71
book published: 2021
rating: 5
read at: 2022/03/04
date added: 2022/03/05
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
I grew up in Charleston, S.C., a city where the Civil War has always been known the "War of Northern Aggression."

Every Sunday after church, my dad would drive home via The Battery, the beautiful waterfront that bordered the Charleston harbor. As families and other folks walked beneath the sprawling oaks, I'd see Fort Sumter on one side and the big Confederate cannons on the other side, and as that scene passed by my backseat window, I'd think of it as simply a quaint tableau of a landmark moment in our city's collective past.


On many Saturday afternoons in the fall, I'd join my dad for football games at The Citadel. We'd be in the stands, eating roasted peanuts out of a brown paper bag, and hear the song, "Dixie" played after every TD scored by the Bulldogs. Didn't think anything of it.

I had a front-row seat for school integration in elementary school. Loads of Black kids were bused to our school from the other side of town. We learned together, played together and we survived. For the life of me, a kid in his single digits, I couldn't understand the hullabaloo of all those white parents raising such a stink about Black kids getting bused to our school.

As a teenager, I played almost every Sunday afternoon at a gym in downtown Charleston. It belonged to the church I attended, and it sat across the street from the largest slave market in America. Again, never really gave it a thought. That is until by good friend, Chris, an All-State point guard on my high school team, came to play.

When we parked, he looked across the street and pointed out the infamous landmark. "Your gym is across the street from the slave market," he said. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath and walked inside. He never said another word. And he never played at our church's gym again. Chris was Black.

I saw those scenes and sounds from my youth -- the cannons on The Battery, the song "Dixie" and the slave market -- as historical markers to a racist past that I thought was behind us. I grew up Southern Baptist, intoxicated by this Kumbaya idea I had of our community. Whenever racism raised its ugly head in some form, I'd tell myself, "Why can't we all just get along?"

How naive I was.

As I look back now, I see how complicit I was. I didn't do enough or say enough growing up in the Cradle of the Confederacy. I never thought about it enough back then, but the color of my skin gave me a pass against the slights and outright atrocities people of color faced all too often. I was a white middle-class Southerner, protected and privileged, and growing up, I saw slavery as simply a chapter in a history book rather than the psychological yoke around the necks of Black America.

I did shed my blindness. As a journalist for nearly 30 years, with nearly all that time chasing stories in the South, I saw up-close the systemic racism around me and worked hard to write about people of color in an authentic way. I saw my job as a way to dismantle stereotypes and show the community through the written word a more nuanced view of the community that, like every Southern city, lived on the other side of the tracks.

But with the rise of the "Black Lives Matter" movement, I found my education of the Black experience in America wanting. So, I began to seek out. I read, listened and listened some more. I boned up on what had been invisible to me. I was never taught. So, I taught myself.

Over the past two years, I've read much, and I've learned much. But I do believe the best book I've read during that time is Clint Smith's "How the Word Is Passed: A Reckoning with the History of Slavery Across America."

I discovered it last year through an episode of "Fresh Air" when Terri Gross interviewed Smith. He's a poet, an educator, a writer with The Atlantic, and I was taken by the passages he read from his book. You could hear the rhythm of the language in the sentences he read. I remember being taken by Kevin Powers' "Yellow Birds." He was a poet, too. And a war veteran. He used his talent with language to bring out the beautiful, wrenching tale about veterans returning from America's most recent war. I felt Smith would do the same with "How the Word." And man, he did.

So many lines and paragraphs I found were like music on the page. Matter of fact, in a lecture to college journalism class a few weeks ago, I read a passage from "How the Word" to show young writers how landscape and weather can become characters in your prose.

Then there is this line when Smith talked about his grandmother. He wrote: "Her voice is the front porch of a home with everyone you love waiting inside." Love that line.

But his book is more than just lines of beautiful language. There is a righteousness to it. You find that on almost every page.

In "How the Word," Smith becomes a travel writer and takes us to significant places in slavery's past. Through his own observations, your eyes become his eyes. And from that, you see things and read things that should shake you awake from any benign ignorance you may have. At least, that's what it did for me.

I chalk up Smith's "How The Word" as an important book to read at this critical juncture in our history. We all hear so much today about white politicians and white parents pushing to educate kids on a more sanitized version of history. I call bullshit. If we do, we gain nothing except an ignorant populace. Like Heather McGhee's "The Sum of Us: What Racism Costs Everyone and How We Can Prosper Together," 'How the Word" gives you what I see is so necessary -- a more nuanced look at our history that I hope will help move us forward as a nation.

That is, if that can happen.

In the third to last paragraph in the book, Smith writes: "In order for our country to collectively move forward, it is not enough to have a patchwork of places that are honest about this history while being surrounded by other spaces that undermine it. It must be a collective endeavor to learn and confront the story of slavery and how it has shaped the world we live in today."

For the last sentence in his book, Smith adds this: "At some point, it is no longer a question of whether we can learn this history, but whether we have the collective will to reckon with it."

True.
]]> The Power of the Dog 128073
Phil and George are brothers, more than partners, joint owners of the biggest ranch in their Montana valley. Phil is the bright one, George the plodder. Phil is tall and angular; George is stocky and silent. Phil is a brilliant chess player, a voracious reader, an eloquent storyteller; George learns slowly, and devotes himself to the business.

Phil is a vicious sadist, with a seething contempt for weakness to match his thirst for dominance; George has a gentle, loving soul. They sleep in the room they shared as boys, and so it has been for forty years. When George unexpectedly marries a young widow and brings her to live at the ranch, Phil begins a relentless campaign to destroy his brother's new wife. But he reckons without an unlikely protector.

From its visceral first paragraph to its devastating twist of an ending, The Power of the Dog will hold you in its grip.


WITH AN AFTERWORD BY ANNIE PROULX]]> 293 Thomas Savage 0316610895 Jeri 4 argosy-book-group
Savage knew the life of a ranch. He grew up in a cattle ranch in Montana, and after graduating with a writing degree at Colby College in Maine and getting married, he came back to his family's ranch to work. By the time he was 29, Savage had been a ranch hand and wrangler for years before he went back east to later teach at Suffolk University and later Brandeis. So, he knew the terrain of "The Power of the Dog."

But what struck me was he saw himself as the misfit on the ranch, a lot like Peter in the book. He saw his mom and his stepdad like Rose and George from the book, and he patterned Phil after his eccentric step uncle. And he didn't bathe either.

We read this novel for our book club. We're all guys, and we all came away liking it. That hasn't happened in a loooong time. We talked about the talent behind Savage's writing. He is a deft scene crafter. We also talked about how Savage described in an opaque, yet effective way the pain of hiding your sexuality in such a macho culture of cowboys and cattle. Like ranch life, Savage knew that terrain well, too.

He had several long-term relationships with men. His wife knew. So did his daughter, one of his three children. He was a closeted gay man. Yet, unlike his own father, he didn't want a divorce. He adored his family, and he wanted to keep it intact. After his wife died in 1989, he kept her picture by his bedside until his death in 2003. He was 88 when he died, a grandfather to nine, a great grandfather to 11 and a writer of 13 novels, spanning from 1944 to 1988.

If you haven't seen the film adaptation of Savage's book on Netflix, do. Jane Campion does Savage justice. And it seems about time. "The Power of the Dog" came out in 1967. Only now it is getting widespread recognition. Writes the L.A. Times: "Savage writes like thunder and lightning. A flash will illuminate startling detail, a rumble will bring a fierce revelation, a philosophy, a big picture.�

As for Savage on his own writing, he says: “I’m writing for rather highly educated people, and I think my writing is only going to appeal to people who have extreme sensitivity. This can come by birth or it can come by education. And if you don’t have it � you’ll never understand me.�

Well, it seems more people do understand Savage on the page. Who knows if they're, as he predicts, "highly educated." But they do know a crafter of a good tale when they see it. ]]> 4.16 1967 The Power of the Dog
author: Thomas Savage
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.16
book published: 1967
rating: 4
read at: 2022/02/13
date added: 2022/03/01
shelves: argosy-book-group
review:
Thomas Savage's "The Power of the Dog" hit me on the first page, the first paragraph with the description of Phil Burbank, the novel mean cowboy, castrating bulls. I emailed to friends of mine in our book club and wrote, in essence, "What the hell?" I kept reading, and I discovered a skilled writer at his craft.

Savage knew the life of a ranch. He grew up in a cattle ranch in Montana, and after graduating with a writing degree at Colby College in Maine and getting married, he came back to his family's ranch to work. By the time he was 29, Savage had been a ranch hand and wrangler for years before he went back east to later teach at Suffolk University and later Brandeis. So, he knew the terrain of "The Power of the Dog."

But what struck me was he saw himself as the misfit on the ranch, a lot like Peter in the book. He saw his mom and his stepdad like Rose and George from the book, and he patterned Phil after his eccentric step uncle. And he didn't bathe either.

We read this novel for our book club. We're all guys, and we all came away liking it. That hasn't happened in a loooong time. We talked about the talent behind Savage's writing. He is a deft scene crafter. We also talked about how Savage described in an opaque, yet effective way the pain of hiding your sexuality in such a macho culture of cowboys and cattle. Like ranch life, Savage knew that terrain well, too.

He had several long-term relationships with men. His wife knew. So did his daughter, one of his three children. He was a closeted gay man. Yet, unlike his own father, he didn't want a divorce. He adored his family, and he wanted to keep it intact. After his wife died in 1989, he kept her picture by his bedside until his death in 2003. He was 88 when he died, a grandfather to nine, a great grandfather to 11 and a writer of 13 novels, spanning from 1944 to 1988.

If you haven't seen the film adaptation of Savage's book on Netflix, do. Jane Campion does Savage justice. And it seems about time. "The Power of the Dog" came out in 1967. Only now it is getting widespread recognition. Writes the L.A. Times: "Savage writes like thunder and lightning. A flash will illuminate startling detail, a rumble will bring a fierce revelation, a philosophy, a big picture.�

As for Savage on his own writing, he says: “I’m writing for rather highly educated people, and I think my writing is only going to appeal to people who have extreme sensitivity. This can come by birth or it can come by education. And if you don’t have it � you’ll never understand me.�

Well, it seems more people do understand Savage on the page. Who knows if they're, as he predicts, "highly educated." But they do know a crafter of a good tale when they see it.
]]> The Old Man and the Sea 2165 Librarian's note: An alternate cover edition can be found here

This short novel, already a modern classic, is the superbly told, tragic story of a Cuban fisherman in the Gulf Stream and the giant Marlin he kills and loses—specifically referred to in the citation accompanying the author's Nobel Prize for literature in 1954.]]> 96 Ernest Hemingway 0684830493 Jeri 4 pleasure-read
Back then, I rushed through it and didn't pay attention to the detail, the language and the pace. But I picked it back when when a friend of mine, a retired Presbyterian minister, talked about how he gave this book to his groomsmen as a gift when he got married.

Back then, he was 24. Now, he's 70. I asked him why a few weeks back, and he told me how he liked the image of the old fisherman named Santiago dreaming about lions from his childhood. Lions? What the hell? I don't remember anything about lions. So, as I was in between books, I picked up this classic once again. I wanted to find the lions mentioned by my friend, the Right Reverend Hotdog, the nickname given to him by his wife. Like many Southerners I know, he can spin a tale in stretched-out syllables. But I picked up "Old Man" again to plumb the literal magic that supposedly lied within. My big question: Does it still hold up?

First, some quick background.

I spent nearly 30 years chasing stories as a newspaper reporter, feature writer and columnist, and I worked at many keyboards trying to capture that urgency Hemingway employed in his writing. He was seen as the gold standard in the newsrooms where I worked. When I was in my 20s, fresh out of j-school, I read Hemingway often because I saw his books as a way to educate me on understanding the intricacies of his style.

That's what really jazzed me when I started reading "Old Man" again. What I discovered is what I hoped to find –� a master at work. Hemingway delivered a simple tale with such spartan, elegant language. Adjectives were few and far between, and his style of taunt sentences were on every page.

So, does this book written in 1952 age well? I think so. But I do see how readers could get bored with the singular nature of the book. And the excessive details on the minutiae of fishing could prompt readers to exclaim, "Enough already!" And yeah, you can see how Hemingway turns Santiago into his version of Captain Ahab and the big marlin is his big white whale. A little derivative, readers could think. Me? Hemingway needs to learn how to use the Oxford comma. Throughout the book, that just bugged me. Blame that on my editors.

Still, those are small complaints. I like "Old Man" this go-round, much better than when I was 16 or 17 and interested more in weekend parties than elegant prose. And this time, I did find those lions. The Right Reverend Hotdog was right. Nice literary device that was. Very Chekov. Found in the beginning, middle and the last sentence in the book. My favorite passage was on page 81. Papa wrote:

"After that he began to dream of the long yellow beach and he saw the first of the lions come down onto it in the early dark and then the other lions came and he rested his chin on the wood of the bows where the ship lay anchored with the evening off-shore breeze and he wanted to see if there would be more lions and he was happy."

Nice.]]> 3.81 1952 The Old Man and the Sea
author: Ernest Hemingway
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.81
book published: 1952
rating: 4
read at: 2022/01/28
date added: 2022/02/13
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
I hadn't read "Old Man" since high school. And you know, that was a long time ago.

Back then, I rushed through it and didn't pay attention to the detail, the language and the pace. But I picked it back when when a friend of mine, a retired Presbyterian minister, talked about how he gave this book to his groomsmen as a gift when he got married.

Back then, he was 24. Now, he's 70. I asked him why a few weeks back, and he told me how he liked the image of the old fisherman named Santiago dreaming about lions from his childhood. Lions? What the hell? I don't remember anything about lions. So, as I was in between books, I picked up this classic once again. I wanted to find the lions mentioned by my friend, the Right Reverend Hotdog, the nickname given to him by his wife. Like many Southerners I know, he can spin a tale in stretched-out syllables. But I picked up "Old Man" again to plumb the literal magic that supposedly lied within. My big question: Does it still hold up?

First, some quick background.

I spent nearly 30 years chasing stories as a newspaper reporter, feature writer and columnist, and I worked at many keyboards trying to capture that urgency Hemingway employed in his writing. He was seen as the gold standard in the newsrooms where I worked. When I was in my 20s, fresh out of j-school, I read Hemingway often because I saw his books as a way to educate me on understanding the intricacies of his style.

That's what really jazzed me when I started reading "Old Man" again. What I discovered is what I hoped to find –� a master at work. Hemingway delivered a simple tale with such spartan, elegant language. Adjectives were few and far between, and his style of taunt sentences were on every page.

So, does this book written in 1952 age well? I think so. But I do see how readers could get bored with the singular nature of the book. And the excessive details on the minutiae of fishing could prompt readers to exclaim, "Enough already!" And yeah, you can see how Hemingway turns Santiago into his version of Captain Ahab and the big marlin is his big white whale. A little derivative, readers could think. Me? Hemingway needs to learn how to use the Oxford comma. Throughout the book, that just bugged me. Blame that on my editors.

Still, those are small complaints. I like "Old Man" this go-round, much better than when I was 16 or 17 and interested more in weekend parties than elegant prose. And this time, I did find those lions. The Right Reverend Hotdog was right. Nice literary device that was. Very Chekov. Found in the beginning, middle and the last sentence in the book. My favorite passage was on page 81. Papa wrote:

"After that he began to dream of the long yellow beach and he saw the first of the lions come down onto it in the early dark and then the other lions came and he rested his chin on the wood of the bows where the ship lay anchored with the evening off-shore breeze and he wanted to see if there would be more lions and he was happy."

Nice.
]]> Anxious People 53799686
Viewing an apartment normally doesn’t turn into a life-or-death situation, but this particular open house becomes just that when a failed bank robber bursts in and takes everyone in the apartment hostage. As the pressure mounts, the eight strangers begin slowly opening up to one another and reveal long-hidden truths.

First is Zara, a wealthy bank director who has been too busy to care about anyone else until tragedy changed her life. Now, she’s obsessed with visiting open houses to see how ordinary people live—and, perhaps, to set an old wrong to right. Then there’s Roger and Anna-Lena, an Ikea-addicted retired couple who are on a never-ending hunt for fixer-uppers to hide the fact that they don’t know how to fix their own failing marriage. Julia and Ro are a young lesbian couple and soon-to-be parents who are nervous about their chances for a successful life together since they can’t agree on anything. And there’s Estelle, an eighty-year-old woman who has lived long enough to be unimpressed by a masked bank robber waving a gun in her face. And despite the story she tells them all, Estelle hasn’t really come to the apartment to view it for her daughter, and her husband really isn’t outside parking the car.

As police surround the premises and television channels broadcast the hostage situation live, the tension mounts and even deeper secrets are slowly revealed. Before long, the robber must decide which is the more terrifying prospect: going out to face the police, or staying in the apartment with this group of impossible people.

Rich with Fredrik Backman’s “pitch-perfect dialogue and an unparalleled understanding of human nature� (Shelf Awareness), Anxious People’s whimsical plot serves up unforgettable insights into the human condition and a gentle reminder to be compassionate to all the anxious people we encounter every day.]]> 336 Fredrik Backman 1982121602 Jeri 4 argosy-book-group
Page 249: "He was my echo. Everything I do is quieter now."

Page 203: "We save those we can. We do our best. Then we try to find a way to convince ourselves that that will just have to ... be enough. So we can live with our failures without drowning."

Page 324: "They say that a person's personality is the sum of their experiences. But that isn't true, at least not entirely, because if our past was all that defined us, we'd never be able to put up with ourselves. We need to be allowed to convince ourselves that we're more than the mistakes we made yesterday. That we are all of our next choices, too, all of our tomorrows."

Nice.

"Anxious People" is Backman's 10th book, and right after Christmas, Netflix released it as a limited series. This, I believe, is the third film made from Backman's mind. Not too bad for a former forklift driver whose dad told his wife: "treat the money as if Fredrik won the lottery, because this probably won't last!"

As for how he found the creative seed for "Anxious People," Backman says: "“I got the idea when I was apartment hunting with my wife.We went to see around nine apartments one day until I was like ‘they are all fine, let’s just pick one. But in that setting, there was also a strange sense of competition that brought out people’s anxieties and insecurities. I am interested in relationship dramas and why people act like idiots, so I found that fascinating.�

Backman is now 40, married with two children. He grew up on the North Sea in southern Sweden in a city founded in 1085. He got his start in writing as a blogger and newspaper columnist. But after his first novel, "A Man Called Ove" came out in 2012, and after selling 500,000 copies in his home country and getting translated into 25 languages, he now writes full-time.

On his writing process, he says: "I'm not a very good writer. And I don't say that to be humble, I'm just saying that I'm not very good technically. I'm better at telling stories than constructing language, which I think can be compared to musicians: the best song writers are rarely the best musicians. You can write a great song using three chords, but that doesn't make you Mozart. So sometimes I have the full story, and sometimes I don't. I rewrote "My Grandmother" maybe 50 times, but I rewrote "Britt-Marie" maybe five.

"Maybe I could put it like this: I have learned to build a "box" for me to play within. Which means I decide the world my character gets to explore, and the limits of it, and I try to write a beginning and an ending to the story first of all. That way I'm free to have new ideas within it."

As for "Anxious People,'' I gave it four stars because it was a good tale, well-told. And Backman has this knack to shine a light into who we are and do it in such a compassionate, humanistic way that I find just damn enchanting.

This was my first Backman read. But it won't be my last.




]]> 4.12 2019 Anxious People
author: Fredrik Backman
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2019
rating: 4
read at: 2022/01/16
date added: 2022/01/17
shelves: argosy-book-group
review:
I was prepared not to like this book too much. When I dove into the first few pages of "Anxious People," I found Backman to be in the vein of Jonathan Franzen -- cynical, snarky writer who looks at the world through a jaundiced lens. Or at least that's how I see Franzen. But the more I dove into this book club selection, the more it surprised me. Backman has a keen eye on the human condition, the intangibles that make us ... us. Case in point:

Page 249: "He was my echo. Everything I do is quieter now."

Page 203: "We save those we can. We do our best. Then we try to find a way to convince ourselves that that will just have to ... be enough. So we can live with our failures without drowning."

Page 324: "They say that a person's personality is the sum of their experiences. But that isn't true, at least not entirely, because if our past was all that defined us, we'd never be able to put up with ourselves. We need to be allowed to convince ourselves that we're more than the mistakes we made yesterday. That we are all of our next choices, too, all of our tomorrows."

Nice.

"Anxious People" is Backman's 10th book, and right after Christmas, Netflix released it as a limited series. This, I believe, is the third film made from Backman's mind. Not too bad for a former forklift driver whose dad told his wife: "treat the money as if Fredrik won the lottery, because this probably won't last!"

As for how he found the creative seed for "Anxious People," Backman says: "“I got the idea when I was apartment hunting with my wife.We went to see around nine apartments one day until I was like ‘they are all fine, let’s just pick one. But in that setting, there was also a strange sense of competition that brought out people’s anxieties and insecurities. I am interested in relationship dramas and why people act like idiots, so I found that fascinating.�

Backman is now 40, married with two children. He grew up on the North Sea in southern Sweden in a city founded in 1085. He got his start in writing as a blogger and newspaper columnist. But after his first novel, "A Man Called Ove" came out in 2012, and after selling 500,000 copies in his home country and getting translated into 25 languages, he now writes full-time.

On his writing process, he says: "I'm not a very good writer. And I don't say that to be humble, I'm just saying that I'm not very good technically. I'm better at telling stories than constructing language, which I think can be compared to musicians: the best song writers are rarely the best musicians. You can write a great song using three chords, but that doesn't make you Mozart. So sometimes I have the full story, and sometimes I don't. I rewrote "My Grandmother" maybe 50 times, but I rewrote "Britt-Marie" maybe five.

"Maybe I could put it like this: I have learned to build a "box" for me to play within. Which means I decide the world my character gets to explore, and the limits of it, and I try to write a beginning and an ending to the story first of all. That way I'm free to have new ideas within it."

As for "Anxious People,'' I gave it four stars because it was a good tale, well-told. And Backman has this knack to shine a light into who we are and do it in such a compassionate, humanistic way that I find just damn enchanting.

This was my first Backman read. But it won't be my last.





]]> Just Mercy 20342617
Bryan Stevenson was a young lawyer when he founded the Equal Justice Initiative, a nonprofit law office in Montgomery, Alabama, dedicated to defending the poor, the incarcerated, and the wrongly condemned.

Just Mercy tells the story of EJI, from the early days with a small staff facing the nation’s highest death sentencing and execution rates, through a successful campaign to challenge the cruel practice of sentencing children to die in prison, to revolutionary projects designed to confront Americans with our history of racial injustice.

One of EJI’s first clients was Walter McMillian, a young Black man who was sentenced to die for the murder of a young white woman that he didn’t commit. The case exemplifies how the death penalty in America is a direct descendant of lynching � a system that treats the rich and guilty better than the poor and innocent.]]> 336 Bryan Stevenson Jeri 4 pleasure-read
When we sat down Saturday to talk about, I realized how my daughter and I picked the same examples to talk about. And our conversation stretched for nearly an hour, and I saw my daughter in a more expansive light. And yes, we both liked the book much.

Stevenson is a natural storyteller, and he uses the people he has represented to show all of us the grace we must have to one another. Very New Testament. Plus, the structure of the book works well. He weaves the story of Walter McMillian, an Alabama man wrongly accused of murder, as the tentpole of a book that asks the question, "Do we really need to sanction death?" And Stevenson writes Walter's story in such a way that it reminded me of the best legal fiction I've read.

But what takes Stevenson's book to the next level is that he makes us think. Case in point is a line -- or two -- on page 289. Stevenson writes: "We have a choice. We an embrace our humanness, which means embracing our broken natures and compassion that remains our best hope for healing. Or we can deny our brokenness, forswear compassion, and as a result, deny our own humanity."

Yeah, do dig that. Plus, my daughter and I had another bond, something else to link us together. Thank you, Mr. Stevenson.]]> 4.62 2014 Just Mercy
author: Bryan Stevenson
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.62
book published: 2014
rating: 4
read at: 2022/01/06
date added: 2022/01/09
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
Of any book I've read in the past decade, this book as Heather mcGhee's "Sum of Us" has been the most impactful. I read it back in 2017. Loved it. So, when my 19-year-old daughter returned from college for Christmas break, we did another book read together. I always give her a few books to pick from, and this time, she picked, "Just Mercy."

When we sat down Saturday to talk about, I realized how my daughter and I picked the same examples to talk about. And our conversation stretched for nearly an hour, and I saw my daughter in a more expansive light. And yes, we both liked the book much.

Stevenson is a natural storyteller, and he uses the people he has represented to show all of us the grace we must have to one another. Very New Testament. Plus, the structure of the book works well. He weaves the story of Walter McMillian, an Alabama man wrongly accused of murder, as the tentpole of a book that asks the question, "Do we really need to sanction death?" And Stevenson writes Walter's story in such a way that it reminded me of the best legal fiction I've read.

But what takes Stevenson's book to the next level is that he makes us think. Case in point is a line -- or two -- on page 289. Stevenson writes: "We have a choice. We an embrace our humanness, which means embracing our broken natures and compassion that remains our best hope for healing. Or we can deny our brokenness, forswear compassion, and as a result, deny our own humanity."

Yeah, do dig that. Plus, my daughter and I had another bond, something else to link us together. Thank you, Mr. Stevenson.
]]> Bewilderment 56404444 An alternative cover edition for this ISBN can be found here.

A heartrending new novel from the Pulitzer Prize–winning and #1 New York Times best-selling author of The Overstory.

The astrobiologist Theo Byrne searches for life throughout the cosmos while single-handedly raising his unusual nine-year-old, Robin, following the death of his wife. Robin is a warm, kind boy who spends hours painting elaborate pictures of endangered animals. He’s also about to be expelled from third grade for smashing his friend in the face. As his son grows more troubled, Theo hopes to keep him off psychoactive drugs. He learns of an experimental neurofeedback treatment to bolster Robin’s emotional control, one that involves training the boy on the recorded patterns of his mother’s brain�

With its soaring descriptions of the natural world, its tantalizing vision of life beyond, and its account of a father and son’s ferocious love, Bewilderment marks Richard Powers’s most intimate and moving novel. At its heart lies the question: How can we tell our children the truth about this beautiful, imperiled planet?]]> 278 Richard Powers 0393881148 Jeri 3 pleasure-read
First of all, Richard Powers has a poet's touch when it comes to language. There are sentences and whole paragraphs that are downright beautiful, and in his 13th novel to date, he has not lost that touch of how to details human emotions and describes our natural world. Take this section on page 264:

**
Tall bird stalking. Every five minutes, half a step. The bird was a piece of standing driftwood. Even the fish forgot. When the heron at last jabbed out, Robin shrieked. The strike crossed two meters with barely a lean-in from the bird. It came back upright, a meal the size of astonishment dangling from its mouth. The fish seemed too big to slip down the bird's throat. But that baggy gullet opened, and in another moment, not even a bulge betrayed what had happened.

Robin whooped, and the sound startled the bird into flight. It bent, kicked, flapped its massive wings. It looked even more pterodactyl as it lifted, and the croaking it made as it took off was older than emotion. The clumsy launch turned graceful. Robin hung on the bird as it threaded the undergrowth and was gone. He went on staring at the spot where the great thing had disappeared. He turned to m,e and said, "Mom's here."

**

Robin is the troubled third-grader "on the spectrum" specialists told his dad. The dad is Theo Byrne, an astrobiologist recently widowed. The father-son saga takes center stage in a dystopian novel of science fiction that shows an America in the throes of environmental destruction and political upheaval. Sound familiar?

The journey of Theo and his son, Robin, will take the reader into cutting-edge science that involves everything from astronomy to decoded neurofeedback, or DecNef. The science of DecNef helps Robin immensely. And yet, DecNef takes Powers' novel on a melodramatic turn reminiscent of the mouse in the 1966 novel, "Flowers of Algernon." Dammit, I thought, all shit is gonna break loose. It did. Robin declines, and he dies in the end of hypothermia on a rock in the middle of a stream in the Great Smoky Mountains. In that final scene, his dad surrounds him with a thermal blanket and his own body to keep him warm to no avail.

Part of me wanted to scream at the end. But I kept telling myself that life is messy, not always tied up in a neat bow. And fiction, especially good fiction, is a window onto a world that is often broken and maligned. And that's where my "And yet" comes from. Beautiful writing. Great construction. And tender story of father and son that reminds me of Cormac McCarthy's "The Road." At the end of "The Road," an incredibly violent dystopian novel, I felt uplifted. At the end of "Bewilderment," not so much. And yet, it gave us readers a tale whose theme can be taken straight from the well-known quote of Carl Sagan: "We make our world significant by the courage of our questions and the depth of our answers."

We find that courage in Theo, a nine-year-old who responds to the plight of our planet just as passionately as we all should. That makes it good fiction. Now, if we'll only listen.


]]> 3.87 2021 Bewilderment
author: Richard Powers
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.87
book published: 2021
rating: 3
read at: 2021/12/26
date added: 2021/12/26
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
I caught Ezra Klein's interview with Richard Powers a few months back, and I knew I wanted to plow into "Bewilderment" when I could. I had "Overstory" on my bookshelf since right before the pandemic, and even with its ocean of stellar reviews, I had yet to pick it up. So, I made "Bewilderment" my first Richard Powers' read. After months on the local library's list, I snagged it right right before Christmas. The bottom line? I liked it. And yet ....

First of all, Richard Powers has a poet's touch when it comes to language. There are sentences and whole paragraphs that are downright beautiful, and in his 13th novel to date, he has not lost that touch of how to details human emotions and describes our natural world. Take this section on page 264:

**
Tall bird stalking. Every five minutes, half a step. The bird was a piece of standing driftwood. Even the fish forgot. When the heron at last jabbed out, Robin shrieked. The strike crossed two meters with barely a lean-in from the bird. It came back upright, a meal the size of astonishment dangling from its mouth. The fish seemed too big to slip down the bird's throat. But that baggy gullet opened, and in another moment, not even a bulge betrayed what had happened.

Robin whooped, and the sound startled the bird into flight. It bent, kicked, flapped its massive wings. It looked even more pterodactyl as it lifted, and the croaking it made as it took off was older than emotion. The clumsy launch turned graceful. Robin hung on the bird as it threaded the undergrowth and was gone. He went on staring at the spot where the great thing had disappeared. He turned to m,e and said, "Mom's here."

**

Robin is the troubled third-grader "on the spectrum" specialists told his dad. The dad is Theo Byrne, an astrobiologist recently widowed. The father-son saga takes center stage in a dystopian novel of science fiction that shows an America in the throes of environmental destruction and political upheaval. Sound familiar?

The journey of Theo and his son, Robin, will take the reader into cutting-edge science that involves everything from astronomy to decoded neurofeedback, or DecNef. The science of DecNef helps Robin immensely. And yet, DecNef takes Powers' novel on a melodramatic turn reminiscent of the mouse in the 1966 novel, "Flowers of Algernon." Dammit, I thought, all shit is gonna break loose. It did. Robin declines, and he dies in the end of hypothermia on a rock in the middle of a stream in the Great Smoky Mountains. In that final scene, his dad surrounds him with a thermal blanket and his own body to keep him warm to no avail.

Part of me wanted to scream at the end. But I kept telling myself that life is messy, not always tied up in a neat bow. And fiction, especially good fiction, is a window onto a world that is often broken and maligned. And that's where my "And yet" comes from. Beautiful writing. Great construction. And tender story of father and son that reminds me of Cormac McCarthy's "The Road." At the end of "The Road," an incredibly violent dystopian novel, I felt uplifted. At the end of "Bewilderment," not so much. And yet, it gave us readers a tale whose theme can be taken straight from the well-known quote of Carl Sagan: "We make our world significant by the courage of our questions and the depth of our answers."

We find that courage in Theo, a nine-year-old who responds to the plight of our planet just as passionately as we all should. That makes it good fiction. Now, if we'll only listen.



]]> Razorblade Tears 54860585 A Black father. A white father. Two murdered sons. A quest for vengeance.

Ike Randolph has been out of jail for fifteen years, with not so much as a speeding ticket in all that time. But a Black man with cops at the door knows to be afraid.

The last thing he expects to hear is that his son Isiah has been murdered, along with Isiah’s white husband, Derek. Ike had never fully accepted his son but is devastated by his loss.

Derek’s father Buddy Lee was almost as ashamed of Derek for being gay as Derek was ashamed his father was a criminal. Buddy Lee still has contacts in the underworld, though, and he wants to know who killed his boy.

Ike and Buddy Lee, two ex-cons with little else in common other than a criminal past and a love for their dead sons, band together in their desperate desire for revenge. In their quest to do better for their sons in death than they did in life, hardened men Ike and Buddy Lee will confront their own prejudices about their sons and each other, as they rain down vengeance upon those who hurt their boys.

Alternate cover edition of ISBN 9781250252708]]> 336 S.A. Cosby Jeri 3 argosy-book-group
In the 16 or so years of the book club we readers call Argosy, there is never been such a virulent response to a book we read. Sorry, Shawn Cosby. Or S.A. You got panned for "Razorblade Tears."

Said Sam: "It's the worst book I've read in my adult life."

Said Rob: "I think he was just writing a film script."

Said Chris: "Well, I lowered my expectations."

Said Pat: "What was he trying to say?"

And Philip. He couldn't make it. So, he emailed his complaints. All nine.

And me? Well, I liked "Razorblade Tears." Shawn Cosby is a writer who can turn a tale. In "Razorblade Tears," his third novel, he writes about how two fathers with a checkered past -- one white, the other black -- come to understand their gay sons after their murder and how they seek revenge on those who killed them. A classic revenge tale from a writer I enjoyed. I read his second novel, "Blacktop Wasteland." Liked that one, too. Now, a little about Shawn.

He's a writer from Virginia, a man who dropped out of college to take care of his ailing mother. He then took on an assortment of jobs, from managing a hardware store to working as a bouncer in a bar. Meanwhile, he wrote.

His hard work seemingly has paid off. "Razorblade Tears" made many best-of lists this year, and his story of redemption has been optioned to be turned into a movie. As the story itself, Shawn says:

"When people read my books, they see the African American characters in my books and talk about their strength and depth of character. That’s me paying homage to the people I knew and the people who came before me and suffered such outrageous indignities."

As for Southern fiction in general -- and how "Razorblade Tears," his third book fits with that genre -- he says:

"The holy trinity of Southern fiction is race, class and sex. Those are the underpinnings of the great books of the south, whether it’s William Faulkner’s Light in August or Flannery O’Connor’s Wise Blood. For me, the best southern fiction takes the hypocrisy of the south, a region that seeks to steep itself in religion and moral rigidity, and melds that with the reality of a multitude of social, sexual and class backgrounds and situations."

I like that. As for Philip and Sam, Rob, Pat and Chris? Not so much.

]]> 4.08 2021 Razorblade Tears
author: S.A. Cosby
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.08
book published: 2021
rating: 3
read at: 2021/11/25
date added: 2021/12/15
shelves: argosy-book-group
review:
All I got to say is this: Wow.

In the 16 or so years of the book club we readers call Argosy, there is never been such a virulent response to a book we read. Sorry, Shawn Cosby. Or S.A. You got panned for "Razorblade Tears."

Said Sam: "It's the worst book I've read in my adult life."

Said Rob: "I think he was just writing a film script."

Said Chris: "Well, I lowered my expectations."

Said Pat: "What was he trying to say?"

And Philip. He couldn't make it. So, he emailed his complaints. All nine.

And me? Well, I liked "Razorblade Tears." Shawn Cosby is a writer who can turn a tale. In "Razorblade Tears," his third novel, he writes about how two fathers with a checkered past -- one white, the other black -- come to understand their gay sons after their murder and how they seek revenge on those who killed them. A classic revenge tale from a writer I enjoyed. I read his second novel, "Blacktop Wasteland." Liked that one, too. Now, a little about Shawn.

He's a writer from Virginia, a man who dropped out of college to take care of his ailing mother. He then took on an assortment of jobs, from managing a hardware store to working as a bouncer in a bar. Meanwhile, he wrote.

His hard work seemingly has paid off. "Razorblade Tears" made many best-of lists this year, and his story of redemption has been optioned to be turned into a movie. As the story itself, Shawn says:

"When people read my books, they see the African American characters in my books and talk about their strength and depth of character. That’s me paying homage to the people I knew and the people who came before me and suffered such outrageous indignities."

As for Southern fiction in general -- and how "Razorblade Tears," his third book fits with that genre -- he says:

"The holy trinity of Southern fiction is race, class and sex. Those are the underpinnings of the great books of the south, whether it’s William Faulkner’s Light in August or Flannery O’Connor’s Wise Blood. For me, the best southern fiction takes the hypocrisy of the south, a region that seeks to steep itself in religion and moral rigidity, and melds that with the reality of a multitude of social, sexual and class backgrounds and situations."

I like that. As for Philip and Sam, Rob, Pat and Chris? Not so much.


]]> The Alchemist 18144590 The Alchemist has become a modern classic, selling millions of copies around the world and transforming the lives of countless readers across generations.

Paulo Coelho's masterpiece tells the mystical story of Santiago, an Andalusian shepherd boy who yearns to travel in search of a worldly treasure. His quest will lead him to riches far different—and far more satisfying—than he ever imagined. Santiago's journey teaches us about the essential wisdom of listening to our hearts, recognizing opportunity and learning to read the omens strewn along life's path, and, most importantly, following our dreams.]]> 182 Paulo Coelho 0062315005 Jeri 4 pleasure-read
Straight up, I enjoyed it. Coelho can weave a story well. But what sets this book apart for me is really a pencil. Any time I can read a book with a pencil in my hand is a good thing. And "The Alchemist" is a good thing. I underlined passages, wrote in the margins and boxed in entire paragraphs and quotes. Like this one:

'When you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it."

Or this one.

When someone makes a decision, he is really diving into a strong current that will carry him to places he had never dreamed of when he first made the decision.

Or this.

"Tell your heart that the fear of suffering is worse than the suffering itself. And that no heart has never suffered when it goes in search of its dreams because every second of the search is a second's encounter with God and with eternity."

Sure, you can be cynical about "The Alchemist" and its lessons. But this simply told tale tells us much about the human condition and the need to follow your heart. That, I believe, will never grow old.]]> 4.01 1988 The Alchemist
author: Paulo Coelho
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.01
book published: 1988
rating: 4
read at: 2021/12/15
date added: 2021/12/15
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
I had heard about "The Alchemist" for years. My teenage daughter read it in high school, and I caught an interview with him on "On Being" with Krista Tippett. So, I bought a used copy. But that used copy sat on my shelf for years. But last month, my wife recommended that I listen to an interview of him with Oprah Winfrey. I did. I then figured it was time. After I finished another book, I picked up "The Alchemist" to see for myself now a parable of a shepherd boy had enchanted a generation of readers since it first came out in 1988.

Straight up, I enjoyed it. Coelho can weave a story well. But what sets this book apart for me is really a pencil. Any time I can read a book with a pencil in my hand is a good thing. And "The Alchemist" is a good thing. I underlined passages, wrote in the margins and boxed in entire paragraphs and quotes. Like this one:

'When you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it."

Or this one.

When someone makes a decision, he is really diving into a strong current that will carry him to places he had never dreamed of when he first made the decision.

Or this.

"Tell your heart that the fear of suffering is worse than the suffering itself. And that no heart has never suffered when it goes in search of its dreams because every second of the search is a second's encounter with God and with eternity."

Sure, you can be cynical about "The Alchemist" and its lessons. But this simply told tale tells us much about the human condition and the need to follow your heart. That, I believe, will never grow old.
]]> <![CDATA[Across the River: Life, Death, and Football in an American City]]> 55919290 384 Kent Babb 0062950592 Jeri 4 pleasure-read
This is an exceptional book, and Kent is a talented storyteller. His day job is at the Washington Post where he writes stories about how popular culture intersects with sports. And "Across the River" definitely does that. The book sprang out of an assignment he had with WaPo. And from that experience, he turned his feature piece into a book that examines how a football coach named Brice Brown helps his teenage players learn about life in a place where poverty, murder and lost opportunities are ever-present as the sunrise. That place is "Algiers," the city that sits across the river from New Orleans.

What struck me about the book was how immersive Kent got into the lives of his characters. To make this book work, Kent had to do that. He flew back and forth to New Orleans and became a part of the locker room. In doing so, he showed in an incredibly unflinching way how players survive -- and how they don't. In the middle of it all is this enigma of a football coach, a giant of a man, a football savant.

Like the cult TV series, "Friday Night Lights," "Across the River" is all about football. And then, it's not. It's not all Xs and Os. There's heartbreak and personal triumph. They both go hand in hand, and at the hands of a talented storyteller, names in a newspaper's box score turn into three-dimensional characters we empathize with and pull for with each turn of the page. In doing so, we see America. We also see hope.]]> 4.46 Across the River: Life, Death, and Football in an American City
author: Kent Babb
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.46
book published:
rating: 4
read at: 2021/11/13
date added: 2021/11/14
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
I always trust Tommy Tomlinson with reading suggestions. Tommy is a former winning columnist with the Charlotte Observer who now steers "Southbound," a podcast on Charlotte's NPR station WFAE. So, when he mentioned "Across the River" in his weekly newsletter and had Kent Babb on his podcast, I knew this would be an enriching read. Plus, Kent calls himself a "proud graduate of the University of South Carolina." And well, I am that, too. So, I dove into "Across The River."

This is an exceptional book, and Kent is a talented storyteller. His day job is at the Washington Post where he writes stories about how popular culture intersects with sports. And "Across the River" definitely does that. The book sprang out of an assignment he had with WaPo. And from that experience, he turned his feature piece into a book that examines how a football coach named Brice Brown helps his teenage players learn about life in a place where poverty, murder and lost opportunities are ever-present as the sunrise. That place is "Algiers," the city that sits across the river from New Orleans.

What struck me about the book was how immersive Kent got into the lives of his characters. To make this book work, Kent had to do that. He flew back and forth to New Orleans and became a part of the locker room. In doing so, he showed in an incredibly unflinching way how players survive -- and how they don't. In the middle of it all is this enigma of a football coach, a giant of a man, a football savant.

Like the cult TV series, "Friday Night Lights," "Across the River" is all about football. And then, it's not. It's not all Xs and Os. There's heartbreak and personal triumph. They both go hand in hand, and at the hands of a talented storyteller, names in a newspaper's box score turn into three-dimensional characters we empathize with and pull for with each turn of the page. In doing so, we see America. We also see hope.
]]> <![CDATA[The Sum of Us: What Racism Costs Everyone and How We Can Prosper Together]]> 53231851
McGhee embarks on a deeply personal journey across the country from Maine to Mississippi to California, tallying what we lose when we buy into the zero-sum paradigm--the idea that progress for some of us must come at the expense of others. Along the way, she meets white people who confide in her about losing their homes, their dreams, and their shot at better jobs to the toxic mix of American racism and greed. This is the story of how public goods in this country--from parks and pools to functioning schools--have become private luxuries; of how unions collapsed, wages stagnated, and inequality increased; and of how this country, unique among the world's advanced economies, has thwarted universal healthcare.

But in unlikely places of worship and work, McGhee finds proof of what she calls the Solidarity Dividend: gains that come when people come together across race, to accomplish what we simply can't do on our own.

McGhee marshals economic and sociological research to paint a story of racism's costs, but at the heart of the book are the humble stories of people yearning to be part of a better America, including white supremacy's collateral victims: white people themselves. With startling empathy, this heartfelt message from a Black woman to a multiracial America leaves us with a new vision for a future in which we finally realize that life can be more than a zero-sum game.]]> 415 Heather McGhee 0525509569 Jeri 5 pleasure-read Review TK 4.62 2021 The Sum of Us: What Racism Costs Everyone and How We Can Prosper Together
author: Heather McGhee
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.62
book published: 2021
rating: 5
read at: 2021/10/24
date added: 2021/10/24
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
Review TK
]]> The Glass Hotel 45754981 From the award-winning author of Station Eleven, an exhilarating novel set at the glittering intersection of two seemingly disparate events–a massive Ponzi scheme collapse and the mysterious disappearance of a woman from a ship at sea.

Vincent is a bartender at the Hotel Caiette, a five-star lodging on the northernmost tip of Vancouver Island. On the night she meets Jonathan Alkaitis, a hooded figure scrawls a message on the lobby’s glass wall: Why don’t you swallow broken glass. High above Manhattan, a greater crime is committed: Alkaitis is running an international Ponzi scheme, moving imaginary sums of money through clients� accounts. When the financial empire collapses, it obliterates countless fortunes and devastates lives. Vincent, who had been posing as Jonathan’s wife, walks away into the night. Years later, a victim of the fraud is hired to investigate a strange occurrence: a woman has seemingly vanished from the deck of a container ship between ports of call.

In this captivating story of crisis and survival, Emily St. John Mandel takes readers through often hidden landscapes: campgrounds for the near-homeless, underground electronica clubs, the business of international shipping, service in luxury hotels, and life in a federal prison. Rife with unexpected beauty, The Glass Hotel is a captivating portrait of greed and guilt, love and delusion, ghosts and unintended consequences, and the infinite ways we search for meaning in our lives.]]> 307 Emily St. John Mandel 0525521143 Jeri 4 argosy-book-group Liked it. Review to come. 3.66 2020 The Glass Hotel
author: Emily St. John Mandel
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.66
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2021/10/06
date added: 2021/10/06
shelves: argosy-book-group
review:
Liked it. Review to come.
]]> Song of Solomon 11334 338 Toni Morrison 140003342X Jeri 5 pleasure-read
"Will, have you read any Toni Morrison?" I asked.

"No," he responded. "But I know I'd like to. I need to. And Palestinian teenagers need to understand multiple points of view other than what they see in the media."

Or something like that. At least that's how I remember the conversation went. This summer, after I dumped an armload of books at our local used book store, I got enough store credit to fill at least a shelf -- or two. Will wandered the shelves and came out with his own collection. That includes Morrison's "Song of Solomon." I hadn't read it. So, we read it together. And what an illuminating experience it was, a father-son book read.

We had done book reads before. But it was always sports books, ranging from Pete Maravich to Phil Jackson to Coach K. This was different, and those book reads happened when he was a middle schooler. He is now a 2021 college graduate, getting ready to jump into the next chapter of his life, and before he took that leap, we dove into "Song of Solomon." It's a book as rich and layered as anything I had ever read. It's one of the best books I've ever read.

Will and I both came away from "Song of Solomon" pretty spellbound by what we read. And with such an adept storyteller as Morrison at the helm, it was quite the treat. Entire paragraphs were straight-up word art, and dialogue on the page was just downright rich. So were the characters as well as their names. Morrison ushered Will and me into a snapshot of black America from the mid 20th century where Jim Crow, George Wallace and Bull Connor existed. But racism didn't really rear its ugly head in "Song of Solomon." Life did. Hope and struggle. All of us, no matter our gender and skin color, can understand that.

“The black narrative has always been understood to be a confrontation with some white people ... They’re not terribly interesting to me," Morrison once said. "What is interesting to me is what is going on within the community. And within the community, there are no major white players. Once I thought: ‘What is life like if they weren’t there?� Which is the way we lived it, the way I lived it.�

I work as a senior writer at a North Carolina university, and on my office wall is a collection of quotes. Those quotes surround me, and I often look at them when I put fingers to keyboard. One of those quotes is from Morrison. It came from her speech she gave when she won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1993. She said: “We die. That may be the meaning of life. But we do language. That may be the measure of our lives.�

Measure of our lives. That is "Song of Solomon." It's a novel published in 1977 that's full of ghosts, folk tales and people who think they can fly both figuratively and literally. What I mean is, people take flight to a new state of mind and open themselves up to a whole new world.

Seems appropriate for Will. After we finished the book, we sat down the night before he was headed to France for a nine-month teaching fellowship through the French Ministry of Education.

Like Morrison, Will is showing us all how to fly.]]> 4.15 1977 Song of Solomon
author: Toni Morrison
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.15
book published: 1977
rating: 5
read at: 2021/09/19
date added: 2021/09/22
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
It was a year ago, editing my son's Fulbright application about teaching English in Palestine, when I saw it. He name-checked Toni Morrison as one of the authors he'd introduce to Palestinian teenagers to help them understand an American point of view.

"Will, have you read any Toni Morrison?" I asked.

"No," he responded. "But I know I'd like to. I need to. And Palestinian teenagers need to understand multiple points of view other than what they see in the media."

Or something like that. At least that's how I remember the conversation went. This summer, after I dumped an armload of books at our local used book store, I got enough store credit to fill at least a shelf -- or two. Will wandered the shelves and came out with his own collection. That includes Morrison's "Song of Solomon." I hadn't read it. So, we read it together. And what an illuminating experience it was, a father-son book read.

We had done book reads before. But it was always sports books, ranging from Pete Maravich to Phil Jackson to Coach K. This was different, and those book reads happened when he was a middle schooler. He is now a 2021 college graduate, getting ready to jump into the next chapter of his life, and before he took that leap, we dove into "Song of Solomon." It's a book as rich and layered as anything I had ever read. It's one of the best books I've ever read.

Will and I both came away from "Song of Solomon" pretty spellbound by what we read. And with such an adept storyteller as Morrison at the helm, it was quite the treat. Entire paragraphs were straight-up word art, and dialogue on the page was just downright rich. So were the characters as well as their names. Morrison ushered Will and me into a snapshot of black America from the mid 20th century where Jim Crow, George Wallace and Bull Connor existed. But racism didn't really rear its ugly head in "Song of Solomon." Life did. Hope and struggle. All of us, no matter our gender and skin color, can understand that.

“The black narrative has always been understood to be a confrontation with some white people ... They’re not terribly interesting to me," Morrison once said. "What is interesting to me is what is going on within the community. And within the community, there are no major white players. Once I thought: ‘What is life like if they weren’t there?� Which is the way we lived it, the way I lived it.�

I work as a senior writer at a North Carolina university, and on my office wall is a collection of quotes. Those quotes surround me, and I often look at them when I put fingers to keyboard. One of those quotes is from Morrison. It came from her speech she gave when she won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1993. She said: “We die. That may be the meaning of life. But we do language. That may be the measure of our lives.�

Measure of our lives. That is "Song of Solomon." It's a novel published in 1977 that's full of ghosts, folk tales and people who think they can fly both figuratively and literally. What I mean is, people take flight to a new state of mind and open themselves up to a whole new world.

Seems appropriate for Will. After we finished the book, we sat down the night before he was headed to France for a nine-month teaching fellowship through the French Ministry of Education.

Like Morrison, Will is showing us all how to fly.
]]> The Beekeeper of Aleppo 43124137 The unforgettable love story of a mother blinded by loss and her husband who insists on their survival as they undertake the Syrian refugee trail to Europe.

Nuri is a beekeeper; his wife, Afra, an artist. They live a simple life, rich in family and friends, in the beautiful Syrian city of Aleppo--until the unthinkable happens. When all they care for is destroyed by war, they are forced to escape. But what Afra has seen is so terrible she has gone blind, and so they must embark on a perilous journey through Turkey and Greece towards an uncertain future in Britain. On the way, Nuri is sustained by the knowledge that waiting for them is Mustafa, his cousin and business partner, who has started an apiary and is teaching fellow refugees in Yorkshire to keep bees.

As Nuri and Afra travel through a broken world, they must confront not only the pain of their own unspeakable loss, but dangers that would overwhelm the bravest of souls. Above all, they must journey to find each other again.

Moving, powerful, compassionate, and beautifully written, The Beekeeper of Aleppo is a testament to the triumph of the human spirit. It is the kind of book that reminds us of the power of storytelling.]]> 317 Christy Lefteri 1984821210 Jeri 4 argosy-book-group
Plus, Lefteri's parents were refugees themselves. They fled Cyprus after the Turkish invaded in 1974, and the whole experience had traumatized her parents. She remembers her grandmother seeing her son finally make it to England, and she didn't recognize him. She told her granddaughter, "He had blood in his eyes."

So, with that personal background and her experience in Athens, Lefteri crafted a beautiful book about a husband and wife from Syria working to escape to London. Some of my crew thought it was too predictable. But they all felt that she opened a window into what we didn't know -- the life of a refugee. And "Beekeeper" does what books need to do. A reader begins to understand, to connect and become empathetic. That's what good fiction does. And "Beekeeper" is that. It makes us human.]]> 4.14 2019 The Beekeeper of Aleppo
author: Christy Lefteri
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.14
book published: 2019
rating: 4
read at: 2021/07/11
date added: 2021/08/25
shelves: argosy-book-group
review:
My book club crew selected this pick, and it seemed to come at such an appropriate time with refugees fleeing Afghanistan. But what made "The Beekeeper of Aleppo" really work for me was that the author Christy Lefteri got the idea after working for two years as a volunteer at a Unicef supported refugee centre in Athens.

Plus, Lefteri's parents were refugees themselves. They fled Cyprus after the Turkish invaded in 1974, and the whole experience had traumatized her parents. She remembers her grandmother seeing her son finally make it to England, and she didn't recognize him. She told her granddaughter, "He had blood in his eyes."

So, with that personal background and her experience in Athens, Lefteri crafted a beautiful book about a husband and wife from Syria working to escape to London. Some of my crew thought it was too predictable. But they all felt that she opened a window into what we didn't know -- the life of a refugee. And "Beekeeper" does what books need to do. A reader begins to understand, to connect and become empathetic. That's what good fiction does. And "Beekeeper" is that. It makes us human.
]]> The Sweetness of Water 54404602 In the spirit of The Known World and The Underground Railroad, a profound debut about the unlikely bond between two freedmen who are brothers and the Georgia farmer whose alliance will alter their lives, and his, forever.

In the waning days of the Civil War, brothers Prentiss and Landry—freed by the Emancipation Proclamation—seek refuge on the homestead of George Walker and his wife, Isabelle. The Walkers, wracked by the loss of their only son to the war, hire the brothers to work their farm, hoping through an unexpected friendship to stanch their grief. Prentiss and Landry, meanwhile, plan to save money for the journey north and a chance to reunite with their mother, who was sold away when they were boys.

Parallel to their story runs a forbidden romance between two Confederate soldiers. The young men, recently returned from the war to the town of Old Ox, hold their trysts in the woods. But when their secret is discovered, the resulting chaos unleashes convulsive repercussions on the entire community. In the aftermath of so much turmoil, it is Isabelle who emerges as an unlikely leader, proffering a healing vision for the land and for the newly free citizens of Old Ox.

With candor and sympathy, debut novelist Nathan Harris creates an unforgettable cast of characters, depicting Georgia in the violent crucible of Reconstruction. Equal parts beauty and terror, as gripping as it is moving, The Sweetness of Water is an epic whose grandeur locates humanity and love amid the most harrowing circumstances.]]> 368 Nathan Harris 031646127X Jeri 4 pleasure-read
I was hooked.

Harris set his debut novel in rural Georgia right after Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation and set the action in motion with two freed slaves working on a farm and dealing with the racism in a town called Old Ox. At first, I felt Harris' book moved too slow. But once you hit halfway through the 358-page book, it took off. Harris dealt with the big question of what does freedom even mean?

What made it really work, though, were his characters. Harris populated his pages with characters that were rich in detail. Very Dickenesque. You'd turn a page, and you'd watch them transform as they were buffeted by racism, sexuality, violence and grief. Also, Harris' writing was elegant. Just beautiful to read. You can understand why. He was a Michener Fellow in the acclaimed Michener Center for Writers, a three-year program at UT-Austin.

Harris polished "Sweetness" as a Michener Fellow. But he did the heavy lifting in 2013-2015 when he was writing in the morning and at night while delivering food for a delivery service in San Francisco. And really the book started with one question from his history-loving father ––Who am I? His dad couldn't find anything, nothing about his ancestors.

That's what Harris got started. That one question. Now, his book is long-listed for the Booker Prize. And how did that whole subject catch his attention? In an interview with the Booker Prize, Harris said:

"No one else had grappled with what those precious moments, upon being freed, must have been like for those men and women who had spent their life in bondage. I wanted, first, to give them a voice. Then I found the other characters that surrounded them, all those gloriously varied citizens of Old Ox, who I wanted to give a voice to as well. I simply put it all down."

And put it down, he did.]]> 4.08 2021 The Sweetness of Water
author: Nathan Harris
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.08
book published: 2021
rating: 4
read at: 2021/08/23
date added: 2021/08/24
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
I saw "The Sweetness of Water" on some book list online, and I got on the waiting list at the local library. And that list was long. I figured it was because it was an Oprah Book Club pick. But what got me was that author Nathan Harris was 29, and his debut novel had Richard Russo, one of my favorite writers, saying, "Harris has, in a sense, unwritten 'Gone with the Wind,' detonating its phony romanticism, its unearned sympathies, its wretched racism."

I was hooked.

Harris set his debut novel in rural Georgia right after Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation and set the action in motion with two freed slaves working on a farm and dealing with the racism in a town called Old Ox. At first, I felt Harris' book moved too slow. But once you hit halfway through the 358-page book, it took off. Harris dealt with the big question of what does freedom even mean?

What made it really work, though, were his characters. Harris populated his pages with characters that were rich in detail. Very Dickenesque. You'd turn a page, and you'd watch them transform as they were buffeted by racism, sexuality, violence and grief. Also, Harris' writing was elegant. Just beautiful to read. You can understand why. He was a Michener Fellow in the acclaimed Michener Center for Writers, a three-year program at UT-Austin.

Harris polished "Sweetness" as a Michener Fellow. But he did the heavy lifting in 2013-2015 when he was writing in the morning and at night while delivering food for a delivery service in San Francisco. And really the book started with one question from his history-loving father ––Who am I? His dad couldn't find anything, nothing about his ancestors.

That's what Harris got started. That one question. Now, his book is long-listed for the Booker Prize. And how did that whole subject catch his attention? In an interview with the Booker Prize, Harris said:

"No one else had grappled with what those precious moments, upon being freed, must have been like for those men and women who had spent their life in bondage. I wanted, first, to give them a voice. Then I found the other characters that surrounded them, all those gloriously varied citizens of Old Ox, who I wanted to give a voice to as well. I simply put it all down."

And put it down, he did.
]]> Blacktop Wasteland 51182571
After a series of financial calamities (worsened by the racial prejudices of the small town he lives in) Bug reluctantly takes part in a daring diamond heist to solve his money troubles - and to go straight once and for all. However, when it goes horrifically wrong, he's sucked into a grimy underworld which threatens everything, and everyone, he holds dear . . .]]> 285 S.A. Cosby Jeri 4 pleasure-read
Anyway, after hearing that episode of "Southbound," I picked up "Blacktop Wasteland." In doing so, I found a new favorite author.

I read "Blacktop" in three days. And that never happens when I'm not on vacation. I mean, I found myself getting up in the middle of the night to find out where Bug, the mechanic/wheelman gangster, was going to get himself out of his latest mess. What I liked about the book was Shawn wrote Bug, also known as Beauregard, with such depth and empathy. Here was a guy who was married with three kids. He ran a garage, but he tried to steer clear of what he called the "Life," a crime-riddled underworld that had engulfed his father and now engulfed him. When I heard on "Southbound" that Shawn was a fan of James Lee Burke, I knew I had to see where he took his language. And Shawn does well.

On the last page, Shawn wrote: "A dozen other faces floated up from the river of his memories, their mouths slack, their eyes glazed over. Their last words wasted on pleas of mercy. Their last breaths becoming a death rattle in their throats. Other faces joined them, accompanied by the squeal of tires and the shriek of bullets.

"Wives he made widows. Mothers who waited in vain for their sons to come home. Sons who would never see their fathers again. All those faces, all those lives, nothing more than earth, ashes and rust now."

Nice. Shawn's latest is "Razorblade Tears," optioned by Hollywood to be made into a movie.

It all goes to show you that Mosley was right. Shawn, he's a writer.]]> 4.06 2020 Blacktop Wasteland
author: S.A. Cosby
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2021/08/15
date added: 2021/08/18
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
I heard about Shawn Cosby through one of my favorite podcasts, "Southbound," emceed by journalist and former newspaper columnist Tommy Tomlinson out of Charlotte's NPR station, WFAE. Tommy was always a helluva columnist, but he's also an astute interviewer. And when he got Shawn on his show -- aka S.A. Cosby -- I checked it out. I was intrigued by a writer who had worked as a doorman, landscaper, forklift driver and an assistant director of a funeral home. Plus, he was Southern, a guy out of southwestern Virginia who dropped out of college to take care of his ailing mother. He wrote on the side, digging into a slice of working-class Southern slice that I knew well but hardly ever saw in anything I read. He once met crime writer Walter Mosley at a book reading, and Mosley asked Shawn if he was a writer. Shawn mumbled something about writing but having nothing published. Mosley interrupted him and said, "That makes you a writer."

Anyway, after hearing that episode of "Southbound," I picked up "Blacktop Wasteland." In doing so, I found a new favorite author.

I read "Blacktop" in three days. And that never happens when I'm not on vacation. I mean, I found myself getting up in the middle of the night to find out where Bug, the mechanic/wheelman gangster, was going to get himself out of his latest mess. What I liked about the book was Shawn wrote Bug, also known as Beauregard, with such depth and empathy. Here was a guy who was married with three kids. He ran a garage, but he tried to steer clear of what he called the "Life," a crime-riddled underworld that had engulfed his father and now engulfed him. When I heard on "Southbound" that Shawn was a fan of James Lee Burke, I knew I had to see where he took his language. And Shawn does well.

On the last page, Shawn wrote: "A dozen other faces floated up from the river of his memories, their mouths slack, their eyes glazed over. Their last words wasted on pleas of mercy. Their last breaths becoming a death rattle in their throats. Other faces joined them, accompanied by the squeal of tires and the shriek of bullets.

"Wives he made widows. Mothers who waited in vain for their sons to come home. Sons who would never see their fathers again. All those faces, all those lives, nothing more than earth, ashes and rust now."

Nice. Shawn's latest is "Razorblade Tears," optioned by Hollywood to be made into a movie.

It all goes to show you that Mosley was right. Shawn, he's a writer.
]]> Klara and the Sun 54120408
In Klara and the Sun, Kazuo Ishiguro looks at our rapidly changing modern world through the eyes of an unforgettable narrator to explore a fundamental question: what does it mean to love?]]> 340 Kazuo Ishiguro 059331817X Jeri 4 pleasure-read
This is a wonderful book that shines a light on parent-child relationships, the importance of empathy and the power of love. It's inventive, too. Ishiguro tells the story through Klara, a robot better known in the pages as an AF, or "Artificial Friend." Ishiguro spent five years putting together "Klara," and he finished it before the pandemic. But the dystopian novel deals with what feels so present-day pandemic with its themes of inequality, violence and class-infused ignorance. But -- and I don't use this word lightly -- it's a sweet read. A gentle read. When I put down "Klara," I felt warm all over. Pardon the cliche, but true. It's that whole idea of reading books that touch you in the best of ways. "Klara" is one. ]]> 3.71 2021 Klara and the Sun
author: Kazuo Ishiguro
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.71
book published: 2021
rating: 4
read at: 2021/08/12
date added: 2021/08/12
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
I heard about Ishiguro's "Klara and the Sun" through the author Michael Lewis. He was being interviewed by Erza Klein on Klein's NYT's podcast, and at the end of the interview, he asked Lewis about what three books he'd recommend. "Klara and the Sun" was his first, and he talked about how the book is a window into what humanity needs to be. Or something like that. Those were strong words. So, I put my name on a list at our local library to snag a copy. Glad I did.

This is a wonderful book that shines a light on parent-child relationships, the importance of empathy and the power of love. It's inventive, too. Ishiguro tells the story through Klara, a robot better known in the pages as an AF, or "Artificial Friend." Ishiguro spent five years putting together "Klara," and he finished it before the pandemic. But the dystopian novel deals with what feels so present-day pandemic with its themes of inequality, violence and class-infused ignorance. But -- and I don't use this word lightly -- it's a sweet read. A gentle read. When I put down "Klara," I felt warm all over. Pardon the cliche, but true. It's that whole idea of reading books that touch you in the best of ways. "Klara" is one.
]]> <![CDATA[Wilmington's Lie: The Murderous Coup of 1898 and the Rise of White Supremacy]]> 51243325
By the 1890s, Wilmington was North Carolina's largest city and a shining example of a mixed-race community. It was a bustling port city with a burgeoning African American middle class and a Fusionist government of Republicans and Populists that included black aldermen, police officers and magistrates. There were successful black-owned businesses and an African American newspaper, The Record. But across the state--and the South--white supremacist Democrats were working to reverse the advances made by former slaves and their progeny.

In 1898, in response to a speech calling for white men to rise to the defense of Southern womanhood against the supposed threat of black predators, Alexander Manly, the outspoken young Record editor, wrote that some relationships between black men and white women were consensual. His editorial ignited outrage across the South, with calls to lynch Manly.

But North Carolina's white supremacist Democrats had a different strategy. They were plotting to take back the state legislature in November "by the ballot or bullet or both," and then use the Manly editorial to trigger a "race riot" to overthrow Wilmington's multi-racial government. Led by prominent citizens including Josephus Daniels, publisher of the state's largest newspaper, and former Confederate Colonel Alfred Moore Waddell, white supremacists rolled out a carefully orchestrated campaign that included raucous rallies, race-baiting editorials and newspaper cartoons, and sensational, fabricated news stories.

With intimidation and violence, the Democrats suppressed the black vote and stuffed ballot boxes (or threw them out), to win control of the state legislature on November eighth. Two days later, more than 2,000 heavily armed Red Shirts swarmed through Wilmington, torching the Record office, terrorizing women and children, and shooting at least sixty black men dead in the streets. The rioters forced city officials to resign at gunpoint and replaced them with mob leaders. Prominent blacks--and sympathetic whites--were banished. Hundreds of terrified black families took refuge in surrounding swamps and forests.

This brutal insurrection is a rare instance of a violent overthrow of an elected government in the U.S. It halted gains made by blacks and restored racism as official government policy, cementing white rule for another half century. It was not a "race riot," as the events of November 1898 came to be known, but rather a racially motivated rebellion launched by white supremacists.

In Wilmington's Lie, Zucchino uses contemporary newspaper accounts, diaries, letters and official communications to create a gripping and compelling narrative that weaves together individual stories of hate and fear and brutality. This is a dramatic and definitive account of a remarkable but forgotten chapter of American history.]]> 426 David Zucchino 0802128386 Jeri 4 pleasure-read Review to come. 4.41 2020 Wilmington's Lie: The Murderous Coup of 1898 and the Rise of White Supremacy
author: David Zucchino
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.41
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2021/08/01
date added: 2021/08/01
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
Review to come.
]]> <![CDATA[Keep Sharp: Build a Better Brain at Any Age]]> 52754076 Keep your brain young, healthy, and sharp with this science-driven guide to protecting your mind from decline by neurosurgeon and CNN chief medical correspondent Sanjay Gupta.

Throughout our life, we look for ways to keep our mind sharp and effortlessly productive. Now, globetrotting neurosurgeon Dr. Sanjay Gupta offers insights from top scientists all over the world, whose cutting-edge research can help you heighten and protect brain function and maintain cognitive health at any age.

Keep Sharp debunks common myths about aging and cognitive decline, explores whether there’s a “best� diet or exercise regimen for the brain, and explains whether it’s healthier to play video games that test memory and processing speed, or to engage in more social interaction. Discover what we can learn from “super-brained� people who are in their eighties and nineties with no signs of slowing down—and whether there are truly any benefits to drugs, supplements, and vitamins. Dr. Gupta also addresses brain disease, particularly Alzheimer’s, answers all your questions about the signs and symptoms, and shows how to ward against it and stay healthy while caring for a partner in cognitive decline. He likewise provides you with a personalized twelve-week program featuring practical strategies to strengthen your brain every day.

Keep Sharp is the only owner’s manual you’ll need to keep your brain young and healthy regardless of your age!]]> 336 Sanjay Gupta Jeri 4 pleasure-read
"Keep Sharp" delivers what you had suspected about the importance of sleep, diet and exercise in keeping your brain sharp. But he backs it up with studies, interviews and his own personal observations from his nearly 20-year life as a broadcast journalist. I found myself shoehorning time in my day to read it, and that's always a good thing with any book. Also, near the end, he breaks down a 12-week regimen toward building a better brain. Again, easy to understand. So, glad I read it. "Keep Sharp" does deliver.]]> 4.05 2021 Keep Sharp: Build a Better Brain at Any Age
author: Sanjay Gupta
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.05
book published: 2021
rating: 4
read at: 2021/07/25
date added: 2021/07/25
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
"Keep Sharp" has been popular at my local library. I put my name on a waiting list back in April, and I just got it last week. I knew it would be popular. Dr. Gupta was the face of the pandemic in my household. I'd see him almost every morning on CNN breaking down COVID into understandable terms. So, when he talked his book on the air, I figured he would tackle that subject the same way. Plus, I had always been interested in neuroscience, and with his professional roots in neurosurgery, I figured Dr. Gupta would deliver what is often seen as mystical into something informative and easy to understand. He did.

"Keep Sharp" delivers what you had suspected about the importance of sleep, diet and exercise in keeping your brain sharp. But he backs it up with studies, interviews and his own personal observations from his nearly 20-year life as a broadcast journalist. I found myself shoehorning time in my day to read it, and that's always a good thing with any book. Also, near the end, he breaks down a 12-week regimen toward building a better brain. Again, easy to understand. So, glad I read it. "Keep Sharp" does deliver.
]]> <![CDATA[The Philosophy of Andy Warhol (From A to B and Back Again)]]> 31818 A loosely formed autobiography by Andy Warhol, told with his trademark blend of irony and detachment

In The Philosophy of Andy Warhol—which, with the subtitle "(From A to B and Back Again)," is less a memoir than a collection of riffs and reflections—he talks about love, sex, food, beauty, fame, work, money, and success; about New York, America, and his childhood in McKeesport, Pennsylvania; about his good times and bad in New York, the explosion of his career in the sixties, and his life among celebrities.]]> 272 Andy Warhol 0156717204 Jeri 2 pleasure-read
She wanted to dive into it after it came up in her art history class during her freshman year at UNC-Chapel Hill. So, we did a summer book read together. We read it and talked about it. It was our first book read together, and we talked about the book for more than an hour. It was a blast. I loved how she dissected the book and saw clearly how Warhol hid his insecurity with how he interacted with others and showed his savviness for marketing and manipulating the media way before we held magic screens in our hands.

As for the book, well, I didn't love it as much. It was like reading someone social media thread or overhearing a conversation and thinking "Really?!" But then you continue to eavesdrop because you want to see where it all goes. Case in point:

"You can be watching TV and see Coca Cola, and you know that the President drinks Coca Cola, Liz Taylor drinks Coca Cola, and just think, you can drink Coca Cola, too.

"A coke is a coke and no amount of money can get you a better coke than the one the bum on the corner is drinking. All the cokes are the same and all the cokes are good. Liz Taylor knows it, the President knows it, the bum knows it, and you know it."

Or here:

"I’m confused about who the news belongs to. I always have it in my head that if your name’s in the news, then the news should be paying you.
"Because it’s your news and they’re taking it and selling it as their product. But then they always say that they’re helping you, and that’s true too, but still, if people didn’t give the news their news, and if everybody kept their news to themselves, the news wouldn’t have any news.

"So I guess you should pay each other. But I haven’t figured it out fully yet."

And here:

"If a person isn't generally considered beautiful, they can still be a success if they have a few jokes in their pockets. And lots of pockets."

Warhol got all those snippets from using a tape recorder that he called his "wife." And there is some question whether he wrote the book in the first place. Still, what makes any book good is that it prompts you to dig into the writer's life. Warhol, of course, is no exception.

I simply knew him for his art and his association with Velvet Underground (Do love me some Lou Reed). But when I dove into his history, I met a deeply religious gay man, a first-generation Slovak-American from working-class Pittsburgh. He left the Iron City to design shoes in NYC. He became a pop-culture icon unafraid to stretch the boundaries of his art into film and music and later help other visual artists in the process. A captivating figure, he was.

In 1987, he died at age 58. He was buried in a solid bronze casket had gold-plated rails and white upholstery. It was an open casket, and he was dressed in a black cashmere suit, a paisley tie, a platinum wig, and sunglasses.

He was laid out holding a small prayer book and a red rose. The coffin was covered with white roses and asparagus ferns, and at his gravesite in at Catholic cemetery south of Pittsburgh, the priest said a brief prayer and sprinkled holy water on the casket.

Before the coffin was lowered, a friend of Warhol's dropped a copy of Interview magazine, an Interview T-shirt, and a bottle of the Estée Lauder perfume "Beautiful" into the grave. Warhol was buried next to his mother and father.

The year of his death, in accordance with Warhol's will, the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts began. The Foundation remains one of the largest grant-giving organizations for the visual arts in the U.S.

Those details speak volumes, don't they? Just wish I got that kind of emotion and gravitas from "Philosophy." ]]> 3.84 1975 The Philosophy of Andy Warhol (From A to B and Back Again)
author: Andy Warhol
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.84
book published: 1975
rating: 2
read at: 2021/07/18
date added: 2021/07/23
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
This was my daughter's idea.

She wanted to dive into it after it came up in her art history class during her freshman year at UNC-Chapel Hill. So, we did a summer book read together. We read it and talked about it. It was our first book read together, and we talked about the book for more than an hour. It was a blast. I loved how she dissected the book and saw clearly how Warhol hid his insecurity with how he interacted with others and showed his savviness for marketing and manipulating the media way before we held magic screens in our hands.

As for the book, well, I didn't love it as much. It was like reading someone social media thread or overhearing a conversation and thinking "Really?!" But then you continue to eavesdrop because you want to see where it all goes. Case in point:

"You can be watching TV and see Coca Cola, and you know that the President drinks Coca Cola, Liz Taylor drinks Coca Cola, and just think, you can drink Coca Cola, too.

"A coke is a coke and no amount of money can get you a better coke than the one the bum on the corner is drinking. All the cokes are the same and all the cokes are good. Liz Taylor knows it, the President knows it, the bum knows it, and you know it."

Or here:

"I’m confused about who the news belongs to. I always have it in my head that if your name’s in the news, then the news should be paying you.
"Because it’s your news and they’re taking it and selling it as their product. But then they always say that they’re helping you, and that’s true too, but still, if people didn’t give the news their news, and if everybody kept their news to themselves, the news wouldn’t have any news.

"So I guess you should pay each other. But I haven’t figured it out fully yet."

And here:

"If a person isn't generally considered beautiful, they can still be a success if they have a few jokes in their pockets. And lots of pockets."

Warhol got all those snippets from using a tape recorder that he called his "wife." And there is some question whether he wrote the book in the first place. Still, what makes any book good is that it prompts you to dig into the writer's life. Warhol, of course, is no exception.

I simply knew him for his art and his association with Velvet Underground (Do love me some Lou Reed). But when I dove into his history, I met a deeply religious gay man, a first-generation Slovak-American from working-class Pittsburgh. He left the Iron City to design shoes in NYC. He became a pop-culture icon unafraid to stretch the boundaries of his art into film and music and later help other visual artists in the process. A captivating figure, he was.

In 1987, he died at age 58. He was buried in a solid bronze casket had gold-plated rails and white upholstery. It was an open casket, and he was dressed in a black cashmere suit, a paisley tie, a platinum wig, and sunglasses.

He was laid out holding a small prayer book and a red rose. The coffin was covered with white roses and asparagus ferns, and at his gravesite in at Catholic cemetery south of Pittsburgh, the priest said a brief prayer and sprinkled holy water on the casket.

Before the coffin was lowered, a friend of Warhol's dropped a copy of Interview magazine, an Interview T-shirt, and a bottle of the Estée Lauder perfume "Beautiful" into the grave. Warhol was buried next to his mother and father.

The year of his death, in accordance with Warhol's will, the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts began. The Foundation remains one of the largest grant-giving organizations for the visual arts in the U.S.

Those details speak volumes, don't they? Just wish I got that kind of emotion and gravitas from "Philosophy."
]]> <![CDATA[Under Saturn's Shadow: The Wounding and Healing of Men]]> 204773 144 James Hollis 0919123643 Jeri 5 pleasure-read
James Hollis' "Under Saturn's Shadow" is full of OMG moments because I see myself in its pages. I see what I was, and I saw what I'm working to be. And as I read, I kept hearing Gene's voice in my head. I can see why he recommended I read Hollis' book.

I kept a pencil and Post-its at my elbow while I read because I knew I would go back to "Under Saturn's Shadow" time and again for reference and reinvigoration. Many passages grabbed me. Here are two:

"Our mythology is full of heroic adventures -- mountains climbed, ogres fought, dragons defeated -- but it takes even more courage for a man to speak his emotional truths. The hero quest today is not through the physical world but through the badlands of the soul."

"Most men use their job to validate themselves, but they do not feel valued even when they haev achieved success. They use work to validate their identity when they have not done the work of individuation. As Albert Camus noted, "Without work, all life goes rotten. But when work is soulless, life stifles and dies.' While we cannot ignore economic realities, we must also ensure that our work give meaning and substance to our lives. It is necessary for men to decide anew, then, who they are and how they will spend their precious energy."

Hollis' book came out in 1994. Do the math. That's a long time ago. But what you'll find in his 135 pages is pretty timeless, incredibly helpful. And if you're a man at any age working to answer the emotional questions in your life, "Under Saturn's Shadow" will show that you are far from alone. He will give you tips on how to answer those questions and how you can feel more whole. ]]> 4.36 1994 Under Saturn's Shadow: The Wounding and Healing of Men
author: James Hollis
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.36
book published: 1994
rating: 5
read at: 2021/06/29
date added: 2021/06/29
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
It must've been three years ago when I bought "Under Saturn's Shadow." It came recommended by a therapist I was seeing. I'll call him Gene. I saw Gene nearly every week for at least 15 months, and he helped me immensely. He helped me repair my marriage and make me see -- and understand -- what had been unseen and barely understood my whole life. As for "Under Saturn's Shadow," though, I kept it on my bookshelf. I'd see the cover, and I'd be reminded of that precarious time in my life when I felt everything I cared about was slipping through my fingers. This past weekend, though, I picked it up. Life was better, I was better, I was in between books, and I felt it was time face what I feared. I'm glad I did.

James Hollis' "Under Saturn's Shadow" is full of OMG moments because I see myself in its pages. I see what I was, and I saw what I'm working to be. And as I read, I kept hearing Gene's voice in my head. I can see why he recommended I read Hollis' book.

I kept a pencil and Post-its at my elbow while I read because I knew I would go back to "Under Saturn's Shadow" time and again for reference and reinvigoration. Many passages grabbed me. Here are two:

"Our mythology is full of heroic adventures -- mountains climbed, ogres fought, dragons defeated -- but it takes even more courage for a man to speak his emotional truths. The hero quest today is not through the physical world but through the badlands of the soul."

"Most men use their job to validate themselves, but they do not feel valued even when they haev achieved success. They use work to validate their identity when they have not done the work of individuation. As Albert Camus noted, "Without work, all life goes rotten. But when work is soulless, life stifles and dies.' While we cannot ignore economic realities, we must also ensure that our work give meaning and substance to our lives. It is necessary for men to decide anew, then, who they are and how they will spend their precious energy."

Hollis' book came out in 1994. Do the math. That's a long time ago. But what you'll find in his 135 pages is pretty timeless, incredibly helpful. And if you're a man at any age working to answer the emotional questions in your life, "Under Saturn's Shadow" will show that you are far from alone. He will give you tips on how to answer those questions and how you can feel more whole.
]]> <![CDATA[On the Road Less Traveled: An Unlikely Journey from the Orphanage to the Boardroom]]> 54482212
On the Road Less Traveled is the inspirational story of Edmund A. Hajim, an American financier and philanthropist who rises from dire childhood circumstances to achieve professional success and personal fulfillment. At age three, Hajim is kidnapped by his father, driven from St. Louis to Los Angeles, and told that his mother is dead. His father soon abandons him in order to seek employment—mostly in vain—leaving his son behind in a string of foster homes and orphanages. This establishes a pattern of neglect and desertion that continues for Hajim’s entire childhood, forever leaving its mark. From one home to another, the lonely boy learns the value of self-reliance and perseverance despite his financial deprivation and the trauma of being an orphan.

As time passes, Hajim displays a powerful instinct for survival and a burning drive to excel. A highly motivated student and athlete, he earns an NROTC college scholarship to the University of Rochester; serves in the United States Navy; works as an application research engineer; then attends Harvard Business School, where he finds that the financial industry is his true calling. So begins his rapid ascent in the corporate world, which includes senior executive positions at E. F. Hutton, Lehman Brothers, and fourteen years as CEO of Furman Selz, growing the company more than tenfold. He also creates a happy and abundant family life, though he never forgets what it means to struggle. At age sixty, he is reminded of his painful past when a family secret emerges that brings the story full circle.

]]> 288 Ed Hajim 1510764240 Jeri 3 work-read
His father, a Syrian Jew, kidnaps him when he was 3 and tells him his mother died in childbirth. His father then bounces from job to job before joining the Merchant Marines during WWII and hands off Ed to various foster homes and orphanages. Hajim writes pretty candidly about that and circles back around later in the book when he finally realizes his mom isn't dead, and he meets her. In between, he graduates from the University or Rochester, goes into the Navy, gets an MBA from Harvard, gets married, has kids and becomes an incredibly successful businessman.

A classic adversity-to-abundance tale. Hajim writes: "In the end, adversity is a gift. If you don't experience it, you'll never know how to overcome it. The disadvantages I endured sparked my ambition and work ethic. So, it wasn't fate. It was drive -- some call it grit. It's the one thing privileged people who feel entitled to everything and have nothing to fight for often lack. That was never me."

Hajim tells the life story in a classically chronological way. So, it's easy to follow. And if you're into the inside-baseball stories of Wall Street, he takes you on a cursory journey through the growth of businesses he started and sold. Names names, too. But what got me is Hajim's story. It causes you to pause and think, "How did this young kid who really didn't have a family to speak of become a philanthropist, a Wall Street executive and the guy who built a golf course on Nantucket because the other golf course on the island wouldn't let him join?"

So, it's a good read. Plus, his 13-page epilogue is a tips-for-life section that anyone of any age can glean something from. So, all in all, "On The Road Less Traveled" was a nice surprise. ]]> 3.73 2021 On the Road Less Traveled: An Unlikely Journey from the Orphanage to the Boardroom
author: Ed Hajim
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.73
book published: 2021
rating: 3
read at: 2021/06/25
date added: 2021/06/25
shelves: work-read
review:
I read this for work in a day, mining it for structure and style for a forthcoming book at the university where I work. That's how I saw it. At least at first. But Ed Hajim's memoir kept me turning pages to find out what was next. Here's the setup:

His father, a Syrian Jew, kidnaps him when he was 3 and tells him his mother died in childbirth. His father then bounces from job to job before joining the Merchant Marines during WWII and hands off Ed to various foster homes and orphanages. Hajim writes pretty candidly about that and circles back around later in the book when he finally realizes his mom isn't dead, and he meets her. In between, he graduates from the University or Rochester, goes into the Navy, gets an MBA from Harvard, gets married, has kids and becomes an incredibly successful businessman.

A classic adversity-to-abundance tale. Hajim writes: "In the end, adversity is a gift. If you don't experience it, you'll never know how to overcome it. The disadvantages I endured sparked my ambition and work ethic. So, it wasn't fate. It was drive -- some call it grit. It's the one thing privileged people who feel entitled to everything and have nothing to fight for often lack. That was never me."

Hajim tells the life story in a classically chronological way. So, it's easy to follow. And if you're into the inside-baseball stories of Wall Street, he takes you on a cursory journey through the growth of businesses he started and sold. Names names, too. But what got me is Hajim's story. It causes you to pause and think, "How did this young kid who really didn't have a family to speak of become a philanthropist, a Wall Street executive and the guy who built a golf course on Nantucket because the other golf course on the island wouldn't let him join?"

So, it's a good read. Plus, his 13-page epilogue is a tips-for-life section that anyone of any age can glean something from. So, all in all, "On The Road Less Traveled" was a nice surprise.
]]> Young Men and Fire 30044 "blowup" -- an explosive, 2,000-degree firestorm 300 feet deep and 200 feet tall -- a deadly explosion of flame and wind rarely encountered and little understood at the time. Only seconds ahead of the approaching firestorm, the foreman, R. Wagner Dodge, throws himself into the ashes of an "escape fire " - and survives as most of his confused men run, their last moments obscured by smoke. The parents of the dead cry murder, charging that the foreman's fire killed their boys. Exactly what happened in Mann Gulch that day has been obscured by years of grief and controversy. Now a master storyteller finally gives the Mann Gulch fire its due as tragedy.
These first deaths among the Forest Service's elite firefighters prompted widespread examination of federal fire policy, of the field of fire science, and of the frailty of young men. For Maclean, who witnessed the fire from the ground in August of 1949, and even then he knew he would one day become a part of its story. It is a story of Montana, of the ways of wildfires, firefighters, and fire scientists, and especially of a crew, young and proud, who "hadn't learned to count the odds and to sense they might owe the universe a tragedy." This tale is also Maclean's own, the story of a writer obsessed by a strange and human horror, unable to let the truth die with these young men, searching for the last - and lasting - word. A canvas on which to tell many stories, including the story of his research into the story itself. And finally Nature's violence colliding with human fallibility.
Haunted by these deaths for forty years, Norman Maclean returned to the scene with two of the survivors and pursues the mysteries that Mann Gulch has kept hidden since 1949. From the words of witnesses, the evidence of history, and the research of fire scientists, Maclean at last assembles the scattered pieces of the Mann Gulch tragedy; in his last work that consumed 14 years of his life, and earned a 1992 National Book Critics Circle Award.
The excruciating detail of this book makes for a sobering reading experience. Maclean -- a former University of Chicago English professor and avid fisherman -- also wrote A River Runs Through It and Other Stories , which is set along the Missouri River, one gulch downstream from Mann Gulch.

"A magnificent drama of writing, a tragedy that pays tribute to the dead and offers rescue to the living.... Maclean's search for the truth, which becomes an exploration of his own mortality, is more compelling even than his journey into the heart of the fire. His description of the conflagration terrifies, but it is his battle with words, his effort to turn the story of the 13 men into tragedy that makes this book a classic."
—� from New York Times Book Review Editor's Choice, Best Books of 1992

The Men who Perished in the Mann Gulch Fire:
Robert J. Bennett�
Eldon E. Diettert�
James O. Harrison

William J. Heilman�
Phillip R. McVey�
David R. Navon�
Leonard L. Piper�
Stanley J. Reba�
Marvin L. Sherman�
Joseph B. Sylvia

Henry J. Thol, Jr.

Newton R. Thompson

Silas R. Thompson

Survivors of the Fire:
R. Wagner Dodge, foreman�
Walter B. Rumsey

Robert W. Sallee]]> 301 Norman Maclean 0226500624 Jeri 4 pleasure-read
Maclean is known for "A River Runs Through It." That is an exceptional book. "Young Men and Fire" is, too.

Like the young men he wrote about, Maclean was a firefighter for the U.S. Forest Service before he went on to teach at the University of Chicago. So, he knew of what he wrote about in "Young Men and Fire." But this tragedy that occurred in 1949 haunted him for decades. So, he went after it for decades, digging into primary source records, talking to the two survivors and befriending a member of the U.S. Forest Service who hiked Mann Gulch with Maclean as well as went with Maclean when he interviewed a fire investigator.

This is really a beautiful piece of work. Read it, and you'll find paragraphs like this:

"We are beyond where arithmetic can explain what was happening in the piece of nature that had been the head of Mann Gulch. Converging geometries had created something invisible like suction to carry off a natural explanation of the attraction of geometries to each other. In between these geometries for something like four minutes was a painfully moving line with pieces of it dropping out until there came an end to biology. Then it was pure geometry, and later still the solid geometry of concrete crosses." ]]> 4.03 1992 Young Men and Fire
author: Norman Maclean
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.03
book published: 1992
rating: 4
read at: 2021/06/23
date added: 2021/06/23
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
I picked up "Young Men and Fire" after I heard a suggestion from Michael Lewis, author of "Moneyball" and "The Big Short." He was on the Ezra Klein podcast, and as Klein does at the end of every podcast, he asked Lewis for three books to recommend to listeners. Lewis included "Young Men and Fire" in his list. What struck me about this recommendation was that "Young Men and Fire," Norman Maclean's last book, came out in 1992. Yeah, a long time ago. Plus, Lewis is one helluva non-fiction writer, and he simply raved about this book, about how it's a master class on how to approach a non-fiction book project. So, I picked it up, and I found Lewis is so right.

Maclean is known for "A River Runs Through It." That is an exceptional book. "Young Men and Fire" is, too.

Like the young men he wrote about, Maclean was a firefighter for the U.S. Forest Service before he went on to teach at the University of Chicago. So, he knew of what he wrote about in "Young Men and Fire." But this tragedy that occurred in 1949 haunted him for decades. So, he went after it for decades, digging into primary source records, talking to the two survivors and befriending a member of the U.S. Forest Service who hiked Mann Gulch with Maclean as well as went with Maclean when he interviewed a fire investigator.

This is really a beautiful piece of work. Read it, and you'll find paragraphs like this:

"We are beyond where arithmetic can explain what was happening in the piece of nature that had been the head of Mann Gulch. Converging geometries had created something invisible like suction to carry off a natural explanation of the attraction of geometries to each other. In between these geometries for something like four minutes was a painfully moving line with pieces of it dropping out until there came an end to biology. Then it was pure geometry, and later still the solid geometry of concrete crosses."
]]> <![CDATA[Our Higher Calling: Rebuilding the Partnership between America and Its Colleges and Universities]]> 39396209 Our Higher Calling, Holden Thorp and Buck Goldstein draw on interviews with higher education thought leaders and their own experience, inside and outside the academy, to address these problems head on, articulating the challenges facing higher education and describing in pragmatic terms what can and cannot change--and what should and should not change. They argue that those with a stake in higher education must first understand a fundamental compact that has long been at the heart of the American system: a partnership wherein colleges and universities support the development of an educated and skilled citizenry and create new knowledge in exchange for stable public investment and a strong degree of autonomy to pursue research without undue external pressure. By outlining ways to restore this partnership, Thorp and Goldstein endeavor to start a conversation that paves the way for a solution to one of the country's most pressing problems.]]> 208 Holden Thorp 1469646862 Jeri 4 work-read
I came away not bleary-eyed, but better off in having read it. It's a quick read, just under 150 pages, and it ends this way:

"It is a gift, a higher calling, to be a part of American higher education and thereby a part of the important conversation about rebuilding the partnership. Second, because the partnership is with the public, all must be invited to join in the conversation. As one faculty member said, “If students are not strictly customers, then who is our customer?� The answer is the American public: virtually every American has a direct or indirect stake in our system of higher education.

Third, and most important, it is critical to the national interest that American higher education grow and flourish in the face of the obstacles it is now facing. There is no more important manifestation of American ideals, there is no set of institutions more successful at discovering new knowledge, and there is no comparable force better positioned to tackle the world’s problems."

Amen to that.
]]> 4.33 Our Higher Calling: Rebuilding the Partnership between America and Its Colleges and Universities
author: Holden Thorp
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.33
book published:
rating: 4
read at: 2019/02/28
date added: 2021/06/07
shelves: work-read
review:
As the senior writer at a private university in North Carolina, I have to plow into tomes on higher education. Some are dull and as dry as reading a chemistry textbook. "Our Higher Calling" is not. it delivers what it proposed. It gives tangible moves to create a better town-gown situation and creates a fictional conversation with a handful of stakeholders at a fictional public university p to show what every university and every college is facing nationwide. Nice touch, that is.

I came away not bleary-eyed, but better off in having read it. It's a quick read, just under 150 pages, and it ends this way:

"It is a gift, a higher calling, to be a part of American higher education and thereby a part of the important conversation about rebuilding the partnership. Second, because the partnership is with the public, all must be invited to join in the conversation. As one faculty member said, “If students are not strictly customers, then who is our customer?� The answer is the American public: virtually every American has a direct or indirect stake in our system of higher education.

Third, and most important, it is critical to the national interest that American higher education grow and flourish in the face of the obstacles it is now facing. There is no more important manifestation of American ideals, there is no set of institutions more successful at discovering new knowledge, and there is no comparable force better positioned to tackle the world’s problems."

Amen to that.

]]> <![CDATA[Tribe: On Homecoming and Belonging]]> 40940205 War and The Perfect Storm, takes a critical look at post-traumatic stress disorder and the many challenges today’s returning veterans face in modern society.

There are ancient tribal human behaviors-loyalty, inter-reliance, cooperation-that flare up in communities during times of turmoil and suffering. These are the very same behaviors that typify good soldiering and foster a sense of belonging among troops, whether they’re fighting on the front lines or engaged in non-combat activities away from the action. Drawing from history, psychology, and anthropology, bestselling author Sebastian Junger shows us just how at odds the structure of modern society is with our tribal instincts, arguing that the difficulties many veterans face upon returning home from war do not stem entirely from the trauma they’ve suffered, but also from the individualist societies they must reintegrate into.

A 2011 study by the Canadian Forces and Statistics Canada reveals that 78 percent of military suicides from 1972 to the end of 2006 involved veterans. Though these numbers present an implicit call to action, the government is only just taking steps now to address the problems veterans face when they return home. But can the government ever truly eliminate the challenges faced by returning veterans? Or is the problem deeper, woven into the very fabric of our modern existence? Perhaps our circumstances are not so bleak, and simply understanding that beneath our modern guises we all belong to one tribe or another would help us face not just the problems of our nation but of our individual lives as well.

Well-researched and compellingly written, this timely look at how veterans react to coming home will reconceive our approach to veteran’s affairs and help us to repair our current social dynamic.]]> 182 Sebastian Junger Jeri 4 pleasure-read
Sebastian Junger writes in this very workmanlike journalist style, basing his reporting on interviews and research and writing in a clear-eyed way that's easy to understand. His personal stories are fun -- love the Viking helmet story in Spain. But what I've come to enjoy is his take on our future. He writes:

"Acting in a tribal way simply means being willing to make a substantive sacrifice for your community -- be that your neighborhood, your workplace, or your entire country. Obviously, you don't need to be a Navy SEAL in order to do that."

Two pages later, he ends his slender book this way:

"That sense of solidarity is at the core of what it means to be human and undoubtedly helped deliver us to this extraordinary moment in our history. It may also be the only thing that allows us to survive it."

So, my question: Why is it so hard for us to do that?
]]> 4.00 2016 Tribe: On Homecoming and Belonging
author: Sebastian Junger
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2016
rating: 4
read at: 2021/05/31
date added: 2021/05/31
shelves: pleasure-read
review:
I re-read this slender book from 2016 over the long Memorial Day weekend. Just felt this need. Three years ago, I picked it up as partisanship seemingly was ripping our country apart at its very seams. And three years later, not much has changed except for who resides at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. But diving back into "Tribe" is like having a few beers with a friend you trust.

Sebastian Junger writes in this very workmanlike journalist style, basing his reporting on interviews and research and writing in a clear-eyed way that's easy to understand. His personal stories are fun -- love the Viking helmet story in Spain. But what I've come to enjoy is his take on our future. He writes:

"Acting in a tribal way simply means being willing to make a substantive sacrifice for your community -- be that your neighborhood, your workplace, or your entire country. Obviously, you don't need to be a Navy SEAL in order to do that."

Two pages later, he ends his slender book this way:

"That sense of solidarity is at the core of what it means to be human and undoubtedly helped deliver us to this extraordinary moment in our history. It may also be the only thing that allows us to survive it."

So, my question: Why is it so hard for us to do that?

]]> The God of Small Things 9777
Armed only with the invincible innocence of children, they fashion a childhood for themselves in the shade of the wreck that is their family—their lonely, lovely mother, Ammu (who loves by night the man her children love by day), their blind grandmother, Mammachi (who plays Handel on her violin), their beloved uncle Chacko (Rhodes scholar, pickle baron, radical Marxist, bottom-pincher), their enemy, Baby Kochamma (ex-nun and incumbent grandaunt), and the ghost of an imperial entomologist's moth (with unusually dense dorsal tufts).

When their English cousin, Sophie Mol, and her mother, Margaret Kochamma, arrive on a Christmas visit, Esthappen and Rahel learn that Things Can Change in a Day. That lives can twist into new, ugly shapes, even cease forever, beside their river "graygreen." With fish in it. With the sky and trees in it. And at night, the broken yellow moon in it.

The brilliantly plotted story uncoils with an agonizing sense of foreboding and inevitability. Yet nothing prepares you for what lies at the heart of it.

The God of Small Things takes on the Big Themes—Love. Madness. Hope. Infinite Joy. Here is a writer who dares to break the rules. To dislocate received rhythms and create the language she requires, a language that is at once classical and unprecedented. Arundhati Roy has given us a book that is anchored to anguish, but fueled by wit and magic.]]> 321 Arundhati Roy 0679457313 Jeri 3 argosy-book-group
I felt like I needed an organizational chart to keep up with all the characters, and at times, "The God" felt like a slog. But I kept with it all the way to the end because of her writing. Her style reminded me of Gabriel Garcia Marquez in the way her magic realism merged with her non-linear storytelling. Her style also reminded me of why I never read books when I'm tired, when I can't concentrate totally on what's on the page. When I do, I miss things. Then, I end up asking questions like, "Wait a minute. Isn't he dead?" ]]> 3.97 1997 The God of Small Things
author: Arundhati Roy
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.97
book published: 1997
rating: 3
read at: 2021/05/29
date added: 2021/05/29
shelves: argosy-book-group
review:
I really wanted to like "The God of Small Things." Roy is an incredible writer. She structures her scenes in such a beautiful, imaginative way, and even her sentence structure reminds me of a poet who uses her construction as a way to evoke emotion and drama. And yet ...

I felt like I needed an organizational chart to keep up with all the characters, and at times, "The God" felt like a slog. But I kept with it all the way to the end because of her writing. Her style reminded me of Gabriel Garcia Marquez in the way her magic realism merged with her non-linear storytelling. Her style also reminded me of why I never read books when I'm tired, when I can't concentrate totally on what's on the page. When I do, I miss things. Then, I end up asking questions like, "Wait a minute. Isn't he dead?"
]]> <![CDATA[Find Where The Wind Goes: Moments From My Life]]> 1892387
Mae Jemison made history as the first African-American woman in space. But she's also taken center stage as an actress, scientist, doctor, and teacher-not to mention all the "top ten" lists she's made, including People's 50 Most Beautiful People AND the 1999 White House Project's list of the 7 women most likely to be elected President. The adventures of her life make for a truly compelling read. And to top it all off, with her charming sense of humor, Mae is a remarkable storyteller. The variety and richness of Mae Jemison's experiences will inspire every reader who picks up this book.]]> 208 Mae C. Jemison 0439131960 Jeri 3 work-read 3.92 2001 Find Where The Wind Goes: Moments From My Life
author: Mae C. Jemison
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.92
book published: 2001
rating: 3
read at: 2021/04/26
date added: 2021/05/04
shelves: work-read
review:

]]> My Vanishing Country 52219321 Part memoir, part historical and cultural analysis, My Vanishing Country is an eye-opening journey through the South's past, present, and future.

Anchored in in Bakari Sellers' hometown of Denmark, South Carolina, Country illuminates the pride and pain that continues to fertilize the soil of one of the poorest states in the nation. He traces his father’s rise to become a friend of Stokely Carmichael and Martin Luther King, a civil rights hero, and a member of the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), to explore the plight of the South's dwindling rural, black working class―many of whom can trace their ancestry back for seven generations.

In his poetic personal history, we are awakened to the crisis affecting the other “Forgotten Men & Women,� who the media seldom acknowledges. For Sellers, these are his family members, neighbors, and friends. He humanizes the struggles that shape their lives: to gain access to healthcare as rural hospitals disappear; to make ends meet as the factories they have relied on shut down and move overseas; to hold on to precious traditions as their towns erode; to forge a path forward without succumbing to despair.

My Vanishing Country is also a love letter to fatherhood―to Sellers' father, his lodestar, whose life lessons have shaped him, and to his newborn twins, who he hopes will embrace the Sellers family name and honor its legacy.

]]> 227 Bakari Sellers 0062917455 Jeri 3 pleasure-read 3.94 2020 My Vanishing Country
author: Bakari Sellers
name: Jeri
average rating: 3.94
book published: 2020
rating: 3
read at: 2021/04/18
date added: 2021/04/18
shelves: pleasure-read
review:

]]> Deacon King Kong 51045613 The funny, sharp, and surprising story of the shooting of a Brooklyn drug dealer and the people who witnessed it—from James McBride, author of the National Book Award-winning The Good Lord Bird

In September 1969, a fumbling, cranky old church deacon known in the neighborhood as Sportcoat shuffles into the courtyard of the Causeway Housing project in south Brooklyn, pulls a .38 from his pocket, and in front of everybody shoots the project's drug dealer at point-blank range.

The reasons for this desperate burst of violence and the consequences that spring from it lie at the heart of Deacon King Kong, James McBride's novel and his first since his National Book Award-winning The Good Lord Bird. In McBride brings to vivid life the people affected by the shooting: the victim, the African-American and Latinx residents who witnessed it, the white neighbors, the local NYPD cops assigned to investigate what happened, the members of the Five Ends Baptist Church where Sportcoat was deacon, the neighborhood's Italian mobsters, and Sportcoat himself.

As the story deepens, it becomes clear that the lives of the characters—caught in the tumultuous swirl of New York in the late 1960s—overlap in unexpected ways. When the truth finally emerges, McBride shows us that not all secrets can be hidden, that the best way to grow is to face change without fear, and that the seeds of love lie in compassion and hope.]]> 370 James McBride 073521672X Jeri 5 argosy-book-group 4.11 2020 Deacon King Kong
author: James McBride
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2020
rating: 5
read at: 2021/03/31
date added: 2021/04/04
shelves: argosy-book-group
review:

]]> Greenlights 52838315 From the Academy Award®–winning actor, an unconventional memoir filled with raucous stories, outlaw wisdom, and lessons learned the hard way about living with greater satisfaction.

I’ve been in this life for fifty years, been trying to work out its riddle for forty-two, and been keeping diaries of clues to that riddle for the last thirty-five. Notes about successes and failures, joys and sorrows, things that made me marvel, and things that made me laugh out loud. How to be fair. How to have less stress. How to have fun. How to hurt people less. How to get hurt less. How to be a good man. How to have meaning in life. How to be more me.

Recently, I worked up the courage to sit down with those diaries. I found stories I experienced, lessons I learned and forgot, poems, prayers, prescriptions, beliefs about what matters, some great photographs, and a whole bunch of bumper stickers. I found a reliable theme, an approach to living that gave me more satisfaction, at the time, and still: If you know how, and when, to deal with life’s challenges - how to get relative with the inevitable - you can enjoy a state of success I call “catching greenlights.�

So I took a one-way ticket to the desert and wrote this book: an album, a record, a story of my life so far. This is fifty years of my sights and seens, felts and figured-outs, cools and shamefuls. Graces, truths, and beauties of brutality. Getting away withs, getting caughts, and getting wets while trying to dance between the raindrops.

Hopefully, it’s medicine that tastes good, a couple of aspirin instead of the infirmary, a spaceship to Mars without needing your pilot’s license, going to church without having to be born again, and laughing through the tears.

It’s a love letter. To life.

It’s also a guide to catching more greenlights - and to realizing that the yellows and reds eventually turn green too.

Good luck.]]> 289 Matthew McConaughey 0593139135 Jeri 3 pleasure-read 4.21 2020 Greenlights
author: Matthew McConaughey
name: Jeri
average rating: 4.21
book published: 2020
rating: 3
read at: 2021/04/04
date added: 2021/04/04
shelves: pleasure-read
review:

]]>