A Tale of Trauma Beautifully Told

Title: The Round House
Author: Louise Erdrich
Host: Margy

Houseguests were the perfect excuse for us to meet in one of our favorite places -- the book club room at Open Book in downtown Minneapolis. Since all of us have made either major or minor contributions to bringing Open Book about, we were thrilled to sink into the comfy cushions, and discuss.

The perfect combo of wine, grapes, cheese,
nuts, and homemade cookies

Insights and Opinions

First, a quick overview, using the official book description:

"One Sunday in the spring of 1988, a woman living on a reservation in North Dakota is attacked. The details of the crime are slow to surface as Geraldine Coutts is traumatized and reluctant to relive or reveal what happened, either to the police or to her husband, Bazil, and thirteen-year-old son, Joe. In one day, Joe's life is irrevocably transformed. He tries to heal his mother, but she will not leave her bed and slips into an abyss of solitude. Increasingly alone, Joe finds himself thrust prematurely into an adult world for which he is ill prepared.

While his father, who is a tribal judge, endeavors to wrest justice from a situation that defies his efforts, Joe becomes frustrated with the official investigation and sets out with his trusted friends, Cappy, Zack, and Angus, to get some answers of his own. Their quest takes them first to the Round House, a sacred space and place of worship for the Ojibwe. And this is only the beginning."

+ We started by congratulating ourselves on our foresight in choosing this book before it won the National Book Award, clever choosers that we are.

+ Joanne marveled at the prose, so straightforward, yet within two paragraphs, the reader is drawn in, then laughing, then crying. There is no point at which disbelief enters.

+ The relationship between the boys is perfectly drawn -- honest, funny, sweet, male, goofy and frightening all at once. All of the mothers of sons noted the accuracy and bittersweet truth of these young pre-men.

+ Written without quotation marks, the story takes on an almost dreamlike quality and an arms-length distance between the reader and the story.

+ Geraldine's depression and gradual recovery are beautifully realized.

+ Erdrich molds wonderful elder characters -- well-rounded, fully human individuals who are as fascinating as the younger, central characters.

+ A page turner, this book tells us much about a culture that is among us, but hidden from us.

+ Some wondered why this is the book that won the National Book Award versus other Erdrich titles beloved by people in the room -- Love Medicine, or The Plague of Doves, or The Master Butcher's Singing Club (depending on who was doing the beloving). Perhaps this time was simply her time.

+ Bottom line: read it.

Oddments and Telling Details

+ We spent some time discussing Philip Roth's declaration that he's finished with writing, and trying to decide whether or not we care.
+ Everybody appears to be heading off somewhere in January, so we've changed our meeting week so at least some of us can be there. The next meeting is January 14.

A Good Read with Notes Lost Somewhere North of Here

Title: Canada
Author: Richard Ford
Host: Joanne

Pulitzer-prize-winner Richard Ford supplied our October read, which we met to discuss. Unfortunately, the blog writer was sick in bed so missed the conversation. Any notes that may have been made were promptly whisked north of the border, where they are buried in an abandoned field.

But we want credit for having read it, and don't want to forget we read it, either.

So, here is the book description from the publisher, Ecco:

"First, I'll tell about the robbery our parents committed. Then about the murders, which happened later."

When fifteen-year-old Dell Parsons' parents rob a bank, his sense of normal life is forever altered. In an instant, this private cataclysm drives his life into before and after, a threshold that can never be uncrossed.

His parents' arrest and imprisonment mean a threatening and uncertain future for Dell and his twin sister, Berner. Willful and burning with resentment, Berner flees their home in Montana, abandoning her brother and her life. But Dell is not completely alone. A family friend intervenes, spiriting him across the Canadian border, in hopes of delivering him to a better life. There, afloat on the prairie of Saskatchewan, Dell is taken in by Arthur Remlinger, an enigmatic and charismatic American whose cool reserve masks a dark and violent nature.

Undone by the calamity of his parents' robbery and arrest, Dell struggles under the vast prairie sky to remake himself and define the adults he thought he knew. But his search for grace and peace only moves him nearer to a harrowing and murderous collision with Remlinger, an elemental force of darkness.

A true masterwork of haunting and spectacular vision from one of our greatest writers, Canada is a profound novel of boundaries traversed, innocence lost and reconciled, and the mysterious and consoling bonds of family. Told in spare, elegant prose, both resonant and luminous, it is destined to become a classic.

Insights and Opinions

If you have either insights OR opinions, please leave a comment.

Prime Numbers, Intellectual Posturing, and Baseball

Title: The Housekeeper and the Professor
Author: Yoko Ogawa
Host: Gail

We took a highway whose number starts with a prime number (followed by two numbers that have prime numbers as square roots: 394--think about it!) to get to Gail’s welcoming living room where, surrounded by books, we discussed The Housekeeper and the Professor.

Because of the special nature of this book (exploring the delights of a mind that focuses everything through the lens of mathematics) we reminded ourselves that no matter how passionate we feel, we don’t start out “I loved this . . .” or “I hated this.” We also recognized that, had been the title of a book written by an American, it most likely wouldn’t have the theme of mathematics. And some thought the story hinted at more romance than just the love of mathematics.

Insights and Opinions

+ Steve opened the discussion by likening the book to musical theater. “In a musical, the story is constructed to support the songs. Here, the ‘songs’ are lectures about mathematics.” -- a delightful observation, since many of us started the book thinking that we don’t like math, and what are we doing here?

+As we got into it, we found ourselves mulling versions of “why does the world exist? Is it true that math predates human existence? Is this a philosophy of existence? Did humans have to create math or was it already there? Isn’t this the whole platonic ideal?” All of this emerged after the professor introduced the concept of ”zero” as a state of being. (p. 120)

+ Like the Housekeeper, we had to wonder “why ordinary words seemed so exotic when they were used in relation to numbers.”

+ Linda observed that this work felt a lot like The Anthologist, except there we learned a lot about poetry; here we learned a lot about math. She would have loved the book if it were about a poet searching for the perfect word.

+ This book, with its intellectual posturing, reminded Blanche and others of The Elegance of the Hedgehog.

+ Whether we like math or not, the book employed a wonderfully imaginative construct, with mind-tickling details such as the maintenance of hand-written notes all over the professor’s suits to help him since each day starts as a blank, with memory that lasts 80 minutes, and the sub-theme of baseball (some people love the game, others love the statistics. )

+ Still, the plot felt “painfully thin” with a number of missing pieces; when the 80 minutes started feeling limited, we wanted it to go somewhere. Readers who didn’t have time to think through the math found it less engaging. We wondered why the sister-in-law turned over the care of the Professor to a series of housekeepers. Several readers felt we missed a sense of the world in which these characters lived, but Chris--who surprised and delighted us by her appearance--who had lived in Japan, said it is such a controlled society, and she thought it felt true to the country she experienced.

+ While several of us would recommend this book to friends “with a warning,” Gail summed it up best by observing it’s a book you can read on many levels.  And, someone said it is the kind of book that encourages a reader to “stay young, stay inquisitive, don’t limit yourself.”

A Moveable Feast of Moveable Texts

Title: A Moveable Feast
Author: Ernest Hemingway
Host: Linda and Heathcliff

It's one thing to come to book club anticipating a lively discussion. It's another to try and participate in three lively, concurrent conversations because we'd all read different books. Our first clue was when Gail launched the discussion with a question about the chapter entitled The Pilot Fish and the Rich, at which point both Liz and Shirley started thumbing wildly through their copies, which included no such chapter.

The Setup

Well, you can see the problem here.

What Margy read, 1996

What Steve read, which he's had since college

What Joanne read, first edition

What Linda and Gail read, published in 2010

What Shirley and Liz read, 1996

 

 Insights and Opinions

+ While you'd think this would be a major setback, no. Being word people, nobody in our group is stingy with words. However, everybody talked at once, so note-taking was impossible.

+  Reading A Moveable Feast, whichever edition each of us read, was a great deal of fun given the fact that The Paris Wife by Paula McLain was last month's read. Beginning with this novel written from Hemingway's first wife Hadley's point of view and then following up with Hemingway's own recollections of events from their time together added a richness to A Moveable Feast it might otherwise have lacked.

+ Those who'd read A Moveable Feast: The Restored Edition, which includes material eliminated from the first published editions as well as a forward by Patrick Hemingway and an introduction by Sean Hemingway had the benefit of more  of Hemingway's own reminiscences, however fragmentary.

From Publisher's Weekly: "This restored version of Hemingway's posthumously published memoir has been revised to reflect the author's original intentions. The result is less a fluid narrative than an academic exercise, with the bulk of the story—Hemingway's travels, escapades, encounters with other writers like F. Scott Fitzgerald—followed by material read by his son and grandson, and some additional sketches and fragments excluded from the final draft."

+ By the end of our session, those of us who hadn't been lucky enough to read the restored edition resolved to do so, along with The Sun Also Rises and Hemingway's Boat by Paul Hendrickson, which claims in its subtitle to include "everything he loved in life and lost.

+ Important safety tip: When reading a classic with your book club, be sure you choose a specific edition ahead of time and let everybody else know what it is.

+ To make up for the lack of intelligent content describing this month's discussion, extra spaces have been added between paragraphs.

Oddments and Telling Details

+ Congratulations to Linda for things you'll find out about later.

+ Congratulations to Steve on the publication of his new memoir Canoeing The Boundary Waters Wilderness: A Sawbill Log -- new from the History Press. Those of us who were together for the session came away with autographed first editions. Lovely.

+ To find out what we're reading next, look here.

How to Be An Empress

Title: Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman
Author: Robert K. Massie
Host: Lois

To quote from the official book description, "The Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Peter the Great, Nicholas and Alexandra,  and The Romanovs returns with another masterpiece of narrative biography, the extraordinary story of an obscure young German princess who traveled to Russia at fourteen and rose to become one of the most remarkable, powerful, and captivating women in history." And so began our progress through 656 pages and 3 pounds of fascinating history about a little understood woman who became a towering figure on the international scene and the last female ruler of Russia.

Insights and Opinions

Our Girl

+ Massie is a vibrant storyteller who is equally masterful at pacing, prose and finding the best source material to inform his work (including works by scholar Douglas Smith and other historians).

+ Drawing heavily on Catherine's own memoirs, the book is at its most lively when she is speaking for herself. With a remarkably contemporary voice, Catherine invites the reader in as she watches, learns, absorbs, and masters both the Russian language and the Russian people. When Catherine stops writing her own memoirs, that source dries up and with it, the rest of the book. Although still completely entertaining and informative, the book's pace changes after Catherine stops speaking for herself.

+ On the other hand, staying in Catherine's point of view keeps the reader claustrophobically trapped in the palace, just as she is. We see nothing of the country. Look at any set of draperies, and you'll see a pair of boots poking out from the bottom. Minions run endless notes back and forth across the miles of palace hallways, delivering intrigue back and forth. Key figures play out painful personal situations in the middle of rooms full of watching people. So you want to be an empress? Think again.

+ Almost plot-driven, this work reads like a novel. Most histories aren't page-turners, but this one is. Do we feel a PBS mini-series coming up?

+ Fueled by the writings of Voltaire and Diderot, Catherine fearlessly strikes out on a mission to reform Russia using Enlightenment principles, only to be subverted at every step by the incredible complexity of the vast geography in her hands and the intransigent system of entrenched nobility and long-standing serfdom. We should all read about her efforts at creating a Congress of sorts, just so we can feel better about our own.

Her Bling

+ Eventually, as Catherine's memoirs disappear and her history is told from other sources, we strike out across the country and witness the terrible facts of a nobility/serf society.

+ Along the way, the reader is introduced to all of Catherine's great loves, the greatest of whom was Gregory Potemkin. The recognized and approved system of "favorites" makes a certain amount of sense once you are immersed in this imperial world -- profligacy combined with staggering debt, incredible power combined with a complete lack of freedom, the human need for love balanced by the imperative that a monarch trust no one.

Oddments and Telling Details

Indian Food Extravaganza

+ Thanks to Lois for the fab-o Indian food. Yum. Try the Thai-spiced Watermelon Soup on Epicurious. So refreshing.

+ We all want to go away now and read Peter the Great and Nicholas and Alexandra because we expect them to be as entertaining and educational as this massive work.

+ Linda's description of her trip to St. Petersburg and the Hermitage made us all want to visit.

+ And finally, we spent a fair amount of time congratulating ourselves for being such a fine group of readers.

A Deipnosophy on Memory, Manners, and Hats

Title:  A Backward Glance

Author:  Edith Wharton

Host:  Vicky

Our gracious hostess had laid a proper table but the warm spring night prompted us to abandon all inhibition and move the feast outside. There we enjoyed the peaceful view of the lake, the attentions of an adorable watchdog, and the travel stories from Steve’s recent tour of China. As it turns out, he was more forthcoming with personal details than our dear Edith Wharton.

Moveable Feast Before External Transfer

Insights and Opinions

+ Published in 1934 just three years before her death, this autobiography is more notable for what it doesn’t reveal about Edith Wharton than what it does. As Gail pointed out, missing is the story of her difficult relationship with her mother which led to her lifetime of reading and writing. Missing is the fact that she divorced her husband and, definitely missing, is any mention of her long-term affair or publishing career in erotica.

+ Shirley reminded us that the custom in autobiography at the time was much different than the no-holds barred personal memoirs of today.  But still…

+ Wharton was more candid with her observations of Henry James and provided an entirely different portrait of him than the stuffy character we encountered in The Master by Colm Toibin.  She obviously took pains to correct the public misperception.  Her insights into his work – as well as other writers of the time --  were among the best parts of the book for most.

+ Vicky most enjoyed her observations about the writing life and the parts of the book devoted to her own novels.  

+ Perhaps the most astounding revelation was the fact that Wharton was on the French front lines during World War I where she sent regular dispatches to a New York newspaper.

+ As Steve pointed out, the book demanded your full attention and took you down many different avenues, but it served as a vivid reminder of Wharton’s powers as a writer, keen observer, and social critic.

Oddments and Telling Details

+ While attempting to look up every new vocabulary word encountered in the book, starting with “bavolet” on page one, Shirley discovered a hat dictionary online.  (She gave up after 48 words.)

+ Steve has a memoir about the Boundary Waters coming out with History Press that will include the personal stories that didn’t make it into his first book.

+ One of Vicky’s poems has been included in a new anthology and she participated in the Loft’s conference for Writers Over 50.  Interesting to note that registrations for this conference filled in one day!

+ The June meeting is being hosted by Lois on June 18 when we’ll finally discuss Catherine the Great.  Arcadia is still on the list for July but Joann is now decidedly less enthused by the prospect of revisiting the commune. 

A Temperate Reaction to a Snowy Tale

Title: The Snow Child
Author: Eowyn Ivey
Host: Liz

The owls hooted overhead, calling our group to order. "New books for you! New books for you!" After a brief analysis of the party food and a crabby story about Costco, we dove in. We give nothing away if we kick off these notes with the summary paragraph on the book jacket because it's where the book begins: "Homesteaders Jack and Mabel have carved out a quiet life of hard work and routine for themselves in the wilderness that is 1920s Alaska, both still deeply longing for the child it's now impossible for them to have. Yet their love for each other is strong, and in a moment of levity during the season's first snowfall, they play together, building a child out of snow. The next morning, the snow child is gone -- but a trail of tiny footsteps remains."

Leftover birthday party food rearranged to look new

Insights and Opinions

+ Shirley opened discussion with an intriguing question. "Many reviewers of this book say that the appearance of the snow child changed Jack and Mabel's lives. But how?" We kicked that back and forth for awhile, and then decided that yes, the reviewers were right. Both Jack and Mabel were transformed by the snow child and her effects on both their state of mind and their circumstances.
+ Ivey is a deft storyteller who knows how to spin a plot, but the prose is sometimes cliched and quotidian. Joanne was particularly irked by prose like "They laughed merrily" and "Esther chuckled." "I hate people who chuckle," Joanne said.
+ Blanche, who'd come off of a hard week found the book delightful, "very sweet," and a perfect means of uplifting a heavy mood.
+ Margy and Liz agreed that the book was entertaining, never boring, not great literature, but worth a look. It's a nice escape.
+ Most everybody was annoyed by the letter from Mabel's sister, which seems to arrive at a convenient time, carrying a lot of convenient information -- it all seemed a contrived solution to some of the author's challenges, a la "suddenly, a foot came through the door." (Please note: this last line appears nowhere in the book).
+ The chapter in which Mabel attempts suicide is beautifully written.
+ Vicky felt this book would have been a wonderful short story. As soon as she said that, we knew she was right.
+ At the core, this book is about creativity. At the beginning of the story, Mabel is lost in depression. She hasn't been able to create life, and -- a talented artist -- she's put away her pencils and charcoal. She and Jack no longer talk, they no longer touch, and they never make love. Then, in a moment of play, they tap into their frozen creativity, and it all begins.
+ All in all, The Snow Child is an entertaining tale, but a bit light, like a made-for-TV movie. We recommend it with reservations, with one dissention due to curmudgeonry.

Oddments and Telling Details

Part of Liz's library

+ Despite his best efforts, Steve had to miss due to being at the airport after a very long flight back from China. Linda was sick in bed. We missed them both.
+ Kudos to Graywolf Press for Tracy K. Smith's Pulitzer win, which was announced the day we met.
+ After much arguing about what our book is for May, we decided to read A Backward Glance, Edith Wharton's autobiography -- partly because Shirley had already bought it and was halfway through it, and partly because we all agreed it was a good idea.
+ Remember, if ever you need to know the date of our next meeting and the name of the book, visit Coming Up.

One Has Good Reason to Love How It All Began, Doesn't One?

Brie, fruit, gluten-free crackers and bunnies

Title: How It All Began
Author: Penelope Lively
Host: Joanne

With apologies to Vicky, whose good guidance has kept us from ruining many a good book club discussion by firing right out of the chute with "well, I loved this book" or "I hated this book," we were unable to contain ourselves. First comment of the night on Penelope Lively's How It All Began -- "well, I for one loved this book," followed by the second comment -- "thank you for having us read this." We are unanimous in our affection for this fine work.

Insights and Opinions

+ Our group of Midwesterners fell in love with the essential Britishness of this book. Charlotte, one of the main characters who has been injured by a mugger, opines "Just what one didn't want. Being a burden and all that. What one had hoped to avoid." And, as Charlotte's daughter Rose recalls her first interview before being hired by Lord P -- "String of letters after his name; people sometimes glancing at him, thinking: why do I know that face? Shirty enough if anyone looked like taking liberties." Lots of stiff uppers throughout.

+ One of the distinguishing aspects of this novel is the richness of its characters, especially the two older characters -- Charlotte and Lord Peters. These are real people, not just old people being old, as Joanne stated.

+ The academics among us found a lot to recognize in Mark, the unctuous, slimy academic with an agenda who sucks up to Lord Peter to satisfy his own ends.

+ Beautiful details add richness to the narrative without intruding. While riding in a cab, for instance, Charlotte establishes that her cab driver is from Eritrea "and that minicab driving was for him a secondary occupation that funded his main concern, which was the compilation of the first dictionary that would give three-way reference between English and the two main languages spoken in Eritrea. This conversation had been prompted by Charlotte's having noticed that he had a copy of Samuel Johnson's Rasselas lying on the passenger seat." A small vignette that tells us much about both Charlotte's character and the richness of London life.

+ The theme of "story" undergirds the book's structure -- from immigrant Anton's learning to read by consuming children's stories, to the value of reading in general, to the individual stories of each of the characters in the book following an arc of tension and coming to a satisfying conclusion.

+ Margy felt the characters in the book fell into two camps -- those who have lived their lives, and those who have merely ridden along on opportunity.

+ At nearly 80, Lively understands what it means to be on the second half of life. She delivers many wonderful passages about the difficulties of old age, all followed by beautiful passages that show how much joy she takes in life.

+ Definitely read the two-page section on reading as "necessary fix" on pages 34 and 35.

+ The style of this book is somewhat cinematic -- we slip quickly from one character's point of view to another's without apology.

Oddments and Telling Details

+ What's your opinion about the relative merits of looking up unknown words while reading? One of us believes this interrupts the flow of deep reading, while another believes reading with a dictionary nearby is a good thing and helps a reader fully grasp the author's intention. (The question really is "is look-up on an e-reader a good thing or a bad thing?") Discuss.

Death Comes to Pemberley -- Or Does It?

Roses with nosh.

Title: Death Comes to Pemberley
Author: P.D. James
Host: Margy

In fact, Pemberley may never die. Ever since Jane Austen created the fictional estate that is the focus of conflict in her beloved novel Pride and Prejudice, it's been revisited in movies, movie remakes, PBS specials, zombie attacks, and now a murder mystery by renowned author P.D. James. It's interesting how a light mystery that falls into the category of "summer reading" can throw our group of book lovers into a paroxysm of disagreement, but there you have it. We like to complicate things.

Insights and Opinions

+ Whether or not you love this book may depend on whether or not you love Jane Austen and how many times you've read Pride and Prejudice. Those among us who have read Austen recently were less transported than those who hadn't picked up an Austen book in awhile.
+ This is a quick read with strong forward momentum. Many of our group loved the prologue, characterizing it as a "perfect precis" of the original story. If you missed the original, not to worry. James sets the stage for you.
+ P.D. James is clearly a thorough researcher, writing with authority to inhabit a world.
+ Linda felt the book was heavy on plot and thin on characterization. The wit that draws readers of the original work into Elizabeth's character is largely missing. On the other hand, it's perhaps not fair to judge a book against expectations the reader brings to the reading.
+ A few naysayers were bothered by the amount of exposition in the book, but they were roundly shouted down (in our nice non-shouting way).
+ One observer wondered why a writer of P.D. James' status would take on the challenge of extending such a beloved story. This is always a risky proposition.
+ James introduces a joyful cynicism in some of her description -- the pastor's sermon length, the invalids who manage to make it to church for the scandal, and Charlotte's report to her mother on "her cows, poultry, and husband."
+ All in all, five of us characterized the book as "entertaining and fun" -- with two harumphing.

Margy's fabulous library (part of it, actually.
It's spread out all over the house.)

Oddments and Telling Details

+ One of us has actually had dinner with P.D. James, twice. A very gracious woman. The rest of us were suitably impressed.
+ The sommelier did a wonderful job, and we should consider inviting him to every session.
+ Steve will be gone in March, and just back from CHINA at our April meeting.

A State of Wonder Leaving Many Questions

Title: State of Wonder
Author: Anne Patchett
Host: Shirley

Shirley welcomed us with lovely wines and with her ever-popular food offerings that included the divine chocolate she special orders and the Fulton bread and yummy cheeses.

Insights and Opinions

Our discussions are always lively, and the discussion of State of Wonder by Ann Patchett was no exception. Some pondered the possibility that Patchett might be planning a sequel to the book, as we were in a State of Wonder about the following unanswered questions (FYI, every one of these unanswered questions will spoil the story for you if haven't already read it, so fair warning):
• Will the bark-addicted and presumably now quite fertile Marina become pregnant from her roll in the hammock with Anders?
• Will Marina return to the Amazon to assume her position as Dr. Swenson's heir apparent?
• Will Easter be resurrected (again) and find his way back to the Lakashi and Dr. Swenson?
• Will Marina and Mr. Fox ever be on a first-name basis?

+ We all agreed the book is a real page-turner. Most liked the book, and several saw it as Marina's voyage into The Heart of Darkness. We were not unanimous about giving it a thumbs up, however.  Blanche liked the novel enough to want to reread it, Joanne "did not much care for it," and Linda felt the indigenous peoples ("an intractable race...any progress you advance to them will be undone before your back is turned") were not dealt with respectfully.

+ Linda asked if others saw, as she did, a similarity between the way Henrietta Lacks was treated by the doctors at Johns Hopkins and the way the Lakashi were treated by Dr. Swenson and her associates, and she kept waiting for the Big Reveal that would explain why the Lakashi were so intimidated by Dr. Swenson that they allowed her to chart their menstrual periods and take their children's blood. Linda wished Patchett had tackled the issue of corporate greed and addressed the problem inherent in scientific exploration of how to extract whatever raw materials the scientists want without destroying the habitat and culture of the indigenous people who reside in the area under exploration.

+ Margy commented on the book's Minnesota setting and was unconvinced by Ann Patchett's thought that Minnesota (all cold and flat) is so easy to write about.

+ Our criticisms aside, Gail and Steve pointed out and we agreed that Dr. Swenson was a wonderfully drawn and fascinating character and Marina's personal odyssey was compelling.  We were all interested in Patchett's admission that The Poseidon Adventure has been her most important artistic influence, and we could see that in this jungle thriller.

+ Liz missed the whole thing, having thought the session was on Tuesday rather than Monday.