Book #20: The Handmaid's Tale

Title: The Handmaid's Tale
Author: Margaret Atwood

I wrote about how surprised I was by the fact that I liked The Handmaid's Tale here. But like it I did. I was also surprised that even though apparently a lot of our group hated it, we had a relatively well-behaved and contention-free book club discussion about it. Remember ladies, "well-behaved women seldom make history." If you haven't read The Handmaid's Tale, read it, prepare to get angry, and let the feminist inside of you come to the surface and take over for a while. You'll feel so much better if you let her get out every once in a while.

Book #19: The Year My Son and I Were Born

Title: The Year My Son and I Were Born: A Story of Down Syndrome, Motherhood and Self Discovery
Author: Kathryn Lynard Soper

A couple of days ago, a friend came over to my house and asked if she could borrow a few books. I took her through my unpacked and accessible stash and handed her this as a possibility. "Oh, this one is really good," I said. "Is it just good because she's a friend of yours?" she asked. "No, it's legitimately good," I assured her. She took it home with her.

I'm interested to hear what my friend has to say, but I really do think that Kathy Soper's memoir is legitimately good, excellent even, and not just because she's a friend, a mentor, and the Editor-in-Chief at Segullah. I devoured The Year My Son and I Were Born, finishing it in less than 24 hours, and although I don't have a child with Down Syndrome, there were so many parts of the book that resonated with me. Kathy writes with such honesty about being an overachiever and wanting her children to follow in her footsteps, and that's something I can totally identify with. I want my children to reflect well on me, sometimes to their detriment. Kathy's memoir inspired me to try to love my children for who they are and help them become their best selves, even if their best self isn't reflective of the self I want them to become.

Book #18: The Reader

Title: The Reader
Author: Bernhard Schlink

Another book in the reading list inspired by 2008 movies, as well as another one I'm a little surprised that I hadn't read before. The Reader is a deceptively small, light book. It took me only a few hours to read, but several weeks later, it holds its own among the longer, heavier books that I read before and after. It's the story of Michael Berg, fifteen years old and suffering from hepatitis at the book's outset, who goes to thank Hanna Schmitz for helping him home as he was falling ill. Soon Michael and Hanna commence a love affair, which continues for several months until Hanna disappears. Several years later, their paths cross again when Michael is a law student observing a case against former Nazi prison guards, one of whom turns out to be Hanna. Michael eventually discovers the reason for her inexplicable and unhelpful behavior on the stand and reluctantly stays involved in her life.

The Reader isn't an easy book, even though it's short and written in a very straightforward style. I haven't watched the film yet or seen much commentary about it, but I'd guess that most of my peers wouldn't like it much. I've often heard about affairs between teenage boys and older women, and placed the blame on the older woman, but in The Reader, Schlink seems to put an equal level of responsibility on Berg, and doesn't shy away from the way that the relationship affected all of his future relationships. It's worth a read, but don't judge this book by its cover and think it's just a fluff piece.

Book #17: The Private Patient

Title: The Private Patient
Author: PD James

The most interesting thing about PD James's new mystery, The Private Patient, is the uncertain way in which it ends. Baroness James was born in 1920, so she'll be 89 years old this year, but she's been turning out books at the rate of one every two or three years since her first novel was published in 1962, and she hasn't showed signs of stopping, until now. If you really hate spoilers, don't read on, even though nothing I'll say here gives anything away about the mystery of the story, but James seems to imply at the end of the novel, when Detective Adam Dalgliesh marries Emma, that he may soon hand in his badge. Dalgliesh has been James's principal detective since 1962, and although he has miraculously aged very little over the last 47 years, he may be contemplating retirement.

And I'm sad. P.D. James was the first myster writer whose work I ever really loved. When I was in college, I designed a senior seminar for myself to take advantage of being in London on Study Abroad, and a large part of the reason why I chose British Mystery novels for my subject was PD James's work. The world may change, the stock markets may fall, but I loved the predictibility that every two or three years, I could count on a new story by PD James. And The Private Patient is a great mystery with excellent characterization. Baroness James is just as sharp at 88 as she was at 48, and if it's her last novel, I'm glad she's going out strong, but I'll miss her.

Here's an interesting interview with a UK newspaper: http://www.sundayherald.co.uk/arts/arts/display.var.2446079.0.0.php

Book #16: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

Title: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
Author: Stieg Larsson

I'd read some negative reads of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo around Goodreads, and that had me curious. It kept showing up in my "suggested reads" at Amazon.com, so I decided to reserve it at the library, knowing based on my friends' recommendations that I may end up hating it.

I'm a fan of the mystery, thriller, potboiler genre, in limited quantities. I liked The DaVinci Code, but bored with Dan Brown after reading Angels and Demons soon on its heels. Same story with John Grisham-- he held my attention for The Firm and The Pelican Brief, but Playing for Pizza? Not so much. I started reading The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo on a Friday night, and came up for air on Sunday afternoon when the book was done. It's definitely a thriller in the vein of Grisham or Harlan Coben, but it's very engaging and well-done. The characters of Lisbeth Salander and Mikael Blomquist kept me rooting for them, despite their obvious flaws. In fact, I liked the book so much that I ordered the second book in the Milennium Trilogy from England so I wouldn't have to wait until it was published in America this summer. After finishing the first book, I was disappointed that Larsson died after only writing three books instead of the ten that people speculate he was planning, but we'll see if he holds my interest through the next two books in the series.

Book #15: The First Hour I Believed

Title: The First Hour I Believed
Author: Wally Lamb

It's been a long time since I read a Wally Lamb novel, and I was a bit daunted that this one weighed in at about 800 pages. But the story of Caelum and Maureen Quirk grabbed me and held me tight. Already messed up by life and abuse and loss and hard knocks, the couple tries and fails (and tries again) to pull their lives together after Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold open fire at Columbine, where they both work. At first I was really mad about the way the novel ends, but I began to see it as redemptive. Lamb does a great job with his characters-- even the supporting ones (like Caelum's best friend the baker and his mom) seem so real that I felt like they were people I knew in the flesh by the end of the story. At first I couldn't decide if I liked the way Lamb brought two of the most catastrophic events in recent American history together in the novel (Columbine and Katrina) but I eventually decided that these "real life" events only highlighted the way that the modern world is often "too much with us." It was evident that Lamb's recent life mission, working with inmates in a writing program, served as a great inspiration for this piece, and he does a great job of helping us sympathize with Maureen's character without oversentimentalizing.

Book #14: Revolutionary Road

Title: Revolutionary Road
Author: Richard Yates

Like most of you, we saw preview after preview for Revolutionary Road at the movies last fall. Each time we saw it, Eddie would turn to me and say, "That movie looks so depressing. You couldn't pay me to go see it." (And this from the man who secretly adored Titanic). But I was intrigued by the story, and one of these nights, when Eddie's on call, I'm sure I'll watch the movie by myself.

Maybe Eddie would really like the movie, though. He loves the character of Betty Draper on AMC's Mad Men, loved the scene last season when a character on the show called her "so profoundly sad." In Revolutionary Road, April Wheeler is also profoundly sad. She hates that she gave up a life in New York City for a neat a suburban prison too perfect to complain about (so did Betty). She hates that she's unable to break back into acting after quitting to stay home with her kids (Betty tried to get back into modeling). She hates that her equally unhappy husband gets to escape into the city day after day (so does Betty), where he has affair with his secretary (so does Betty's husband). And she really, really hates it when she finds out that she's pregnant with a third child she doesn't want (Betty does too). Do you think the writers at Mad Men are guilty of a little character stealing (RR was written in 1962)? Regardless of the similarities, both Revolutionary Road and Mad Men highlight the hollow promises of the suburbs and of the 1950-1960s ideals, and both, quite frankly scare the crap out of me that I might fall into the same trap that Betty and April find themselves.

Book #13: Girls of Riyadh

Title: Girls of Riyadh
Author: Rajaa Alsanea

Four Saudi girlfriends navigate the years from high school graduation to their mid-twenties.

We discussed Girls of Riyadh in our book club in February, and the idea we kept coming back to was how the conservative Muslim society in which the four friends lived served as an interesting mirror in which to view our own conservative religious culture. Although I'd argue that it's a no-brainer that Mormon women have more freedom than their counterparts in Riyadh (dress and driving alone are striking examples), but the girls in the story often seemed to self-limit based on what they thought other people expected of them. When on character marries a man who was in love with another woman before their arranged marriage, she blames herself because she hasn't been able to lure him into love, then blames him for abandoning her and their child. The style of the book (written as a series of expose emails to a listserv group), with the email's authors serving as both observer and rabble-rouser, allows the audience to feel like they're part of the culture and privy to the gossip that circulates in the world of the four women. It made me feel that rabble-rousers and cultural commentators have an important role in our own culture, and that we all have a responsibility kick against the pricks every once in a while.

Trying to look on the bright side...

I've been in a pessimist funk lately. Half of the ward has houses on the market now, and it seems like everyone else's is getting action but mine. It's been on three and a half weeks and we've had four people through it. Which is about exactly 1/5 of the action others have had. What's the deal? Not sure, but keeping it show-ready all the time is certainly wearing.

So Eddie says I need to focus more on counting my blessings. Here's a sweet little story to share with you:

This morning the big kids had no school and I was determined to make it to the gym for an abs workout and a spinning class. We all got loaded up, left the house in plenty of time, turned onto our town's main road, sped up past a clunky truck, and shortly realized that it wasn't the truck that was clunking, it was me. So I pulled off the road, got out, and quickly saw that I had a completely flat tire. But lo and behold, what did I see right across the street? A car care center, which was already open at 7:50. They got us right on the lift, swapped out the bad tire (with a nail in the side?) for a new one, and we made it to the gym in time for the spinning class. If we'd skipped the gym this morning (which the kids wanted me to do), we wouldn't have known about the flat until we were on our way to Isaac's physical therapy appointment, which we would undoubtedly have missed.

So there you have it. Evidence of a tender mercy. I'd prefer my tender mercies to come in the form of offers on the house, but I'll take what I can get.

The most important meal of the day...

I'll admit it, over the last few months I've been bad about eating breakfast. It's not that I ever miss breakfast (I never miss any meals) but I've been eating bad breakfasts.

When I went on Weight Watchers two years ago, one of the goals I set for myself was no sweets before lunch. While I gradually gave up on all of the other trappings of Weight Watchers (the food journal, the point tracking, the weekly weigh-ins, the sensible portioning), I kept up the ban on dessert foods before lunch, a 180 turn from my former eating patterns, which regularly involved large slabs of cake for breakfast.

But over the last two or three months, I've seen cracks in my breakfast resolve. The first occurred when Maren discovered that she loves Lucky Charms. After portioning out a bowl for her each morning, I'd stuff a few marshmallow bits in my mouth too, and it didn't take long for me to remember how much I like Lucky Charms too (yeah, they're totally gross, but it's one of those "embrace the grossness" kinds of relationships we have). Also, part of the ritual of our trips to the gym is a stop by Shipley's Donuts on the way home for pink-frosted donuts for Isaac and Maren. Lately I've been finishing off their donuts, which is something I hadn't done in the past.

Part of the problem is that I'm hungry in the morning. By the time I'm done at the gym, it's 9:30, and the South Beach Diet bar I put in my purse just doesn't fill me up. By 11:30 I'm always ravenous. Like cram my fist in the bag of chocolate chips and cram as many into my mouth as I can hungry.

But yesterday I had a brainstorm. I can put water on to boil just before taking Isaac to school and by the time I get back five minutes later, it's bubbling. Then, if I add a handful of quick cook oats, some almonds, brown sugar and fruit, I have a great breakfast that keeps me full until breakfast and makes me happy. And it only takes a minute or two longer than pouring myself a bowl of Kashi Go-Lean.

A hot breakfast is probably a no-brainer for other people, but it's something that's been making me very happy for the last few days.