January reading

Still reading Isabel's Bed, but I finished another novel in the meantime. Decided to take a paperback book I owned with me on my trip to Washington D.C. So I went to the bookshelf at home and decided to take along Saying Grace by Beth Gutcheon. An interesting book about private schools and people who are in charge of them. Funny, I just read My Latest Grievance by Elinor Lipman and that too was about private schools. Back to the novel by Beth Gutcheon. She writes about a disagreement that a wife has with her husband over her daughter's life choices. Why is it so hard to disagree with the one person you are in love with, especially about the person that you both love? It seems there ought to be a better way of handling disagreements. It divides families. Sometimes I just think it is because women cannot think like men and men cannot think like women. Laura Schlessinger said something really great, at least I think she said it, "Don't let a man define what motherhood means to you." In that sense don't let your husband tell you how you should feel as a mother, how you should behave as a mother, and how you should think as a mother. Mothering is very emotional. Men just don't get it. It's a good book about family problems, which we all have at one time or another.

Discovering a "New" author

The delight in "discovering" a "new" author is always a thrill to me. When I find an author I like, I want to read all their books, and in order of publication...sometimes. I am savoring another novel by Elinor Lipman at 4 am...and I am agreeing with myself, that yes, this is an author that I will have to read everything. Tonight the novel is Isabel's Bed. I kept picking this book up, reading the end covers, turning it over in my hands, intrigued. But it hadn't really crossed my radar, that's my euphemism for a book that catches my attention mostly for the number of times I read a review, hear something about it, or even notice other people reading that book. Afraid that it might be about a lesbian couple, I put it back, and go on to something else. But, it is now the third novel by Lipman that I have read, okay, I'm not one quarter done, but I will finish it and I am enjoying it. Basically the story is told in the first person by a woman who takes up residence on Cape Cod with another woman, to ghost write the home owner's story and get free room and board in the trade. Who wouldn't like that? Cape Cod in the winter, there's a place I want to go even if I'm only there in my book travels. I have inherited the Cape Cod envy from my Mother, which she craved from her readings of books like the Gilbert's ( of Cheaper by the Dozen fame) Nantucket books. Mr Blandings Builds His Dream House...My Own Cape Cod by Gladys Taber to name a few. My sister sent me Susan Branch's cooking books about Martha's Vineyard. But, I think its Lipman's writing style that I like the most. I started with The Pursuit of Alice Thrift , a delightful comedy of an intern's love life in Boston. Then I read My Latest Grievance which is told by a sixteen year old daughter of houseparents at a small private college. I loved the whole premise of the book,, she discovers her father had been married before her mother, and she meets her father's first wife through the ex-wife's present to her through the mail on her sixteenth birthday. What a delightful way to begin a story. So, I am happy for now because I have an author's books to look forward to for the coming year. And maybe I'll introduce this author to others readers and see where that goes.

"The People's Act of Love" by James Meek

I am three fourths of the way through this novel. It was written in 2005. It is for a book discussion group and this may be the last time I make a suggestion that doesn't come from a so called book discussion suggestion list. I especially liked the part of the novel where Samarin gives his testimony in the chapter, 'The River.' on page 181. "I propose to explain to you something of what I suffered in the prison camp to which I was sent.." It is the story of the Russian student, Samarin who is imprisoned in Siberia. Far above the Arctic, for five years he is imprisoned until the fall of the government after the first world war. Of course I do not know the history of the wars in Russia, and I am not so sure that this book will help fill in the details for me. I should go back and read Dr. Zhivago over again and compare the two.

Happy Thanksgiving

LOOKING FOR THAT GOOD MYSTERY AGAIN

Started a new book, "Sherlock Homes; The Unauthorized Biography" by Nick Rennison. because I never have read any of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's great detective series, I thought this might be a good place to start. Engaging, the character of Sherlock Holmes is examined through historical documents. I especially like the historial inspection of the Victorian age of Holmes, the England of my fantasy world, the England of my forebears. Three of my grandparents lived in England in 1895, not knowing at the time they were to emigrate to America and leave their English world behind. The superpower that England was was shattering, and so went their dreams. Was it family struggles, financial worries or just sheer adventure that brought them out of the bustling England and into New York City? Finding connections to other emigrants they blended their families with others from England, but they also left brothers and sisters in England and I grew up learning about cousins across the seas. Apparently most of the relatives did not emigrate...I have relatives I don't even know about. But, this book gives me a glimpse into the Victorian age of my grandparents. And it is a fascinating portrait.