The Cue Card

Hi. How is everyone doing? We are having mild weather here this week, and it feels a bit like spring but that could change next week. Still March is just around the corner, yay. Are you ready for spring?

It turns out my husband and I are planning a road trip at the beginning of April to visit my parents and stay in Southern California for a few weeks. We have never driven there from Canada and plan to bring our dogs and take four or five days, stopping for sights and walks along the route. It’s going to be a humdinger of a trip, lol. Have you ever taken a long road trip and where did you go?

Meanwhile, I saw a neat article in The Washington Post today about the return of an author who wrote a peculiar and captivating tale in 1997 called Lives of the Monster Dogs, which was sort of a cult hit back then about a colony of talking canines trying to find their place in the world. Now after 27 years, the author Kirsten Bakis has finally written her second novel called King Nyx (due out Feb. 27). It’s not about the Monster Dogs this time but is a feminist gothic tale set in 1918 about a paranormal researcher. I’ll have to add it to my list as I’m glad the author is back.

It reminds me though — back in the 1990s, I wasn’t reading a lot of novels because I was working full-time in D.C., doing grad school, playing tennis, and having a social life too, lol, but Lives of the Monster Dogs was sent to me by my Canadian boyfriend at the time — now my husband — and I read and loved it. The particulars of it are now murky, so a reread is soon in order. I still have my original copy, pictured above, despite two moves and twenty-five years later. Ha, funny how things go. Have you read it?

And now I’ll leave you with a couple reviews of what I finished lately. 

Beyond That, the Sea by Laura Spenser-Ash / Celadon Books /368 pgs /2023

4.5 stars. I really enjoyed this debut novel about 11-year-old girl Beatrix who is sent by her parents to live with a volunteer family in America after the Germans begin bombing London in 1940. The parents are conflicted about sending their daughter but feel it would be safer. Meanwhile the Gregorys, who live in Boston and have two boys (ages 9 and 13), welcome Beatrix into their family and really take a shine to her, especially when they get to their summer place on an island in Maine. 

As the years go by during the war, “Bea” comes to feel more at home with this family than with her own parents and their spare life in London. The novel alternates short chapters among the various characters including: Bea, her parents in London, the parents in America, and their sons William and Gerald, which gives a variety of interesting perspectives. 

I found it really drew me into their world and I especially liked the first half of the book when Bea and the boys are teens and the Gregorys are loving their summers in Maine on the island: swimming, boating, and hiking in the woods. It felt so carefree and fun before America joined the war and they become more involved. The two boys become quite close to Bea.

But then when the war ends and Bea has to leave to return to her parents, things become harder for them all. Their ties with one another become less as the years go by and the kids start careers but is still formative to them all. Years later, they become in touch again after a loss … with visits in America and the UK and their ties develop anew.

I found this poignant story well written and well done and I got caught up in their lives which felt quite real. I didn’t realize there was a program during WWII where parents sent their kids abroad for safety reasons. I’ve read other novels where parents in London sent their kids to the country in the UK during the Blitz, but this abroad premise opened another facet to that circumstance. I found it an accomplished debut and a touching family story.

The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain / 270 pages / 1876 

What can you say about Tom Sawyer? He’s mischievous and imaginative — a cunning orphan boy (around age 12) who often gets himself into trouble and then by some miracle comes out on top looking good. He’s a regular brighter Dennis the Menace of the 1840s … in small-town Missouri along the Mississippi River. I thought the tale of his adventures, which I listened to on audio, was fun and I laughed at times as Tom goes about his ways, turning boring days into adventures. 

He makes white washing the fence look enjoyable, falls for classmate Becky Thatcher, and runs away and plays pirates with his buddy the vagrant Huckleberry Finn and Joe Harper to a nearby island. But later when they’re missing for days and the town thinks they’re dead, they come out awashed with love when they reappear at their own funeral. 

Tom and Huck also come up against Injun Joe and witness the crime he committed in the graveyard, with Tom later testifying in court. Later they go in search of buried treasure … and Tom and Becky get lost in a cave for a few days. It’s scary then and Tom cuts it a bit close in that misadventure with Becky falling weak.

On the whole, the tale is good fun and draws interest for being written in 1876 … of how town life and boys were back then, often like boys are now. Twain was already well on his way with this his first solo novel. His writing and language are often a marvel.

I revisited this classic tale because author Percival Everett is coming out with the novel James in March with reimagines Mark Twain’s Adventures of Huckleberry Finn from Jim’s perspective, which I hope to get to as well as the original.

That’s all for now. What about you — have you read these and what did you think?

Hi all. I hope everyone is well and getting through the storms of February. The photos in the aftermath of California’s epic rainstorm do not look good. I hope it dries out soon. We plan to visit my parents and brother there in April. Meanwhile things are fine here. We received several inches of snow over the weekend and it’s nice and white out again. But we’ve had some heavy fog advisories too, which make driving a bit dicey, especially since there are a lot of deer about, which could dart out of the mist at any minute. Speaking of deer, my husband took this photo when he was out walking the dogs in the evening down the street. I couldn’t believe how many there were! No wonder our bird feeders need to be put away at night, otherwise they’d be emptied. So far, this has been working. 

And do you remember when I was working on my bookcases in the office here? Well here’s how it turned out. There’s actually another smaller bookcase on the opposite wall too. But things seem pared down, right? I got rid of six boxes of books when we moved. And I bought the desk from Pottery Barn, but when it was delivered it turned out to be yellow-ish white, which didn’t go with anything, so then I had it painted to match, argh. Nothing’s easy right? But I’m pleased how it turned out and that I have a window to look out. The natural light makes it nice in there. 

In bookish news, I’d like to continue on with the reading survey we’ve been having. In earlier posts, I asked about when you DNF a book, and if you read multiple books at a time. And now I wonder where you get the majority of your books from (is it from the library, your own stacks, a store, or where?) and also what book format is your most preferred (is it hardback print, e-book, audio, or paperback?). I guess I get most of my reads from the library, and I probably read print hardbacks mostly (with some too on an e-reader) along with listening to downloadable audiobooks from the Libby app, Hoopla, and Audible. What about you?  

And now I’ll leave you with a couple reviews of what I finished lately. 

In Memoriam by Alice Winn / Knopf / 382 pages / 2023 

4.5 stars. This novel will likely give you a heavy book hangover after you finish, meaning these characters and their intense World War I experiences last on considerably after the last pages, though it took me a while to get invested in the story at first, probably not till page 100 did things turn more interesting for me. 

The beginning starts at a British boarding school in 1914 where a group of guys are goofing around together, pulling pranks, fighting, and reading the school’s In Memoriam column to see who’s died or been wounded in the war. They talk of signing up and being heroic in battle. Two smart and sensitive ones in particular, Sidney Ellwood, 17, a Jewish poet, and Henry Gaunt, 18, half-German, stand out and seem caught up on one another without letting the other know, though in time they get close. 

Various boys in their clique seem gay at the school or have gay experiences and you might wonder a bit after awhile if this story is going to be for you. But then when Henry Gaunt skips out and enlists in the war things turn dicey at the front where he’s a captain. And Ellwood follows him by enlisting. They hear of classmates getting killed and see horrific things while in the trenches near Ypres, Belgium, including the Germans use of poisonous gas and friends getting blown apart. It’s while they’re on a mission to breach the enemy’s line that their fates become changed. What happens after includes a couple plot twists as the war goes along that kept me rapidly turning the pages. 

It’s an epic WWI story that puts you right there in the grime, amid the trench fears, wounds, camps, and the aftermath’s shell shock, and propels you to know what’ll happen to the characters: the men — Ellwood and Gaunt — and their prep school classmates. The love between Ellwood and Gaunt brings the experience upfront and closer, and the men feel quite real and brought to life as it goes on. 

Debut author Alice Winn seemingly comes out of nowhere to blow the lid off of this one. Her style was a bit different to me in that the novel includes pages and pages linked by dialogue. In fact, so much of the story and setting she’s able to get across by dialogue alone. There’s not a lot of exposition writing here, which is surprising in a novel that seems to get across much of the atmosphere of the Great War and its battles. Kudos to Winn for this epic tale that left me wondering long after it was over.

Beautyland by Marie-Helene Bertino / FSG / 336 pages / 2024 

4 stars. I liked some of the light humor and touching emotions in this coming-of-age novel about a girl born in 1977 who grows up in Philadelphia with a single mom and is really an alien from a faraway planet, which is known at the begining. For the most part, Adina looks and seems human, but she’s a bit of an outcast and every once in awhile she’s faxing her “superiors” in outer space to report back on human behavior, which surprises her in some regards. She also has a bit of an obsession with astronomer Carl Sagan, who was a believer in extraterrestrial life. 

The narrative follows Adina’s youth in the 1980s and ’90s as she navigates her life with her mom, her school years, and the popular mean cliques, while befriending a neighbor in her grade — Toni and her brother Dominic. 

The three of them eventually wind up in NYC with Adina getting a little dog named Butternut and where Toni works in publishing and persuades Adina to share her writings with the world. The story has some amusing and charming parts as well as some sad ups and downs as Adina grieves over a couple losses and goes through an uneasy breakup. Her Philly Italian mom, who seems opposite of Adina, remains a constant in her life. 

I listened to this as an audiobook narrated well by Andi Arndt, and I enjoyed the story’s premise, its cultural spotlights, as well as Adina’s sensitive sensibilities. My only slight qualm was I would’ve liked to have seen Adina a bit more different than her human counterparts. She’s just a bit nerdy and a loner, but her extraterrestrial being doesn’t stand out all that much. Though towards the end, she begins to wonder about going “home,” or whether to stay on Earth, which lend things some apprehension as the story goes on. This was my first Bertino novel and I think I’d read her again in the future.

That’s all for now. What about you — have you read these and if so, what did you think? 

Hi. I hope everyone is doing well. We had a bit of snow here on Monday, but the freeze has left and now very mild weather is ahead. We went from -40 to +40 degrees in a couple weeks time, which is quite a change and means more outdoors time for me and the dogs, yay. The sky in the photo might look like there’s a fire, but it’s only the sunset and the prospects of warm weather ahead. We’ve started taking the bird feeders around the house down at night because deer have been eating them dry. If you can believe it, papa deer is able to stand on his hind legs, balance, and eat from the bird tray in the photo. The deer are also able to empty the other feeders. Squirrels are less of a problem here, but we are on the lookout.

Not much else is new, but we had a couple notable anniversaries this week. First my husband and I passed our one year anniversary since we moved out of the city for the countryside, which has been fantastic. We love it so much more here. We still have more upgrades to do, but we’ll do them over time as we can. Also today marks eight weeks since my knee replacement surgery and I’m doing well. I go to physical therapy once a week and practice the exercises daily as well as I can pedal an indoor bike. So little by little, I’m returning to normal activities, but just not tennis playing yet, which is okay.

Last week I posed the question about when is it time to DNF a book and you all had great answers about your own rules of thumb for it. So I will pose another book-ish question, which is: Are you a “monogamous reader” — reading a book at a time — or do you prefer to have multiple books going at once? And how many do you usually read at a time? I admit I have generally been a monogamous reader all my life. Once I’m hooked in a book, I like to focus on that one till it’s done. Though I usually have one print read going and one audiobook going at a time. Just recently, along with a fiction read, I’m able to have a nonfiction read going on the side. So perhaps I’m trying to leave monogamous reading behind. What about you?

And now I’ll leave you with a couple reviews about what I finished lately.

Western Lane by Chetna Maroo / Farrar Straus & Giroux / 160 pages / 2023

4.2 stars. I found the writing outstanding in this debut novel set outside London about a British-Indian father and his daughters Gopi, 11, Khush, 13, and Mona, 15, who have just lost their mother as it opens. To occupy them, their father gets them training in squash playing at their nearby rec center Western Lane, though Gopi who narrates the story is the only one who really excels. Her father puts her through a rigorous squash regimen and she begins playing with 13-year-old Ged, whom she begins to like.

However, it’s all very restricted and repressed as the girls, whose Gujarati relatives are lurking and have let the father know they are willing to take and raise a daughter since his wife’s death, live under a tight decorum of rules. But it all begins to weigh on Gopi, her sisters, and the father, and fractures in their family begin to emerge. Towards the end, Gopi trains for a squash tournament that could bring them back together.

Western Lane is a moving coming-of-age story of Gopi’s reckoning and an internal family drama. As an avid tennis player I loved how it brought the sport of squash into Gopi’s drama over the loss of her mother, like a metaphor of her life then. When you’re on the court, “you are alone. That’s how it’s supposed to be. You are supposed to find your own way out,” says Gopi. This novel is a winner and I will watch for whatever Chetna Maroo writes next. This was my first audiobook of the year narrated expertly by British actress Maya Saroya.

The Berry Pickers by Amanda Peters / Harper / 320 pages / 2023

3.75 stars. The story follows the lives of two siblings from Nova Scotia whose indigenous family comes to Maine each berry season to work and pick in the fields. It’s not really a mystery early in the story that as a young child, age 4, the girl goes missing and is raised elsewhere, not fully comprehending her origins. No one knows what happened to her, but her brother, two years older, lives with the loss and guilt over last seeing her. The story, which alternates chapters between Norma and Joe, explores how their lives play out over a few decades in different places and under different circumstances.

The story felt sincere, heartfelt, and agonizing over how the indigenous family is not whole afterwards and how it suffers from various tragedies over the years as well as how the two main characters’ lives face hardships. There’s quite a bit of sadness and longing to it, and the debut author does well to make the two character’s different lives and places feel authentic (it’s quite a visual telling), though there was still just a touch to me that felt a bit contrived and melodramatic. The story’s also sort of predictable. Still it’s an interesting portrayal of their lives, what happened to them in different families, and it kept me turning the pages.

The novel was a pick by my book club, which will be discussing it in February. It seems to include many issues in it about ethnicity, race, and how and where a person is raised, so I think it’ll make for a good discussion.

That’s all for now. What about you — have you read these books and if so, what did you think?

Hi All. We are just coming out of a deep Arctic freeze here, which we were in for about five days. Ouch. At one point it was like -40 (without windchill), which I think is my new record for cold since I’ve lived in Canada. I had my husband “walk” the dogs during the time, lol. Did you get any of the freeze? Now we’re back to regular winter temps and it feels easy in comparison. Even with a snowstorm upon us, it’s much better than a freeze like that.

My reading year is starting off okay, though I feel I’m already getting a bit behind, ha. I had some Publishers Weekly assignments due. Do you remember Adelle Waldman, the author of the 2013 novel The Love Affairs of Nathaniel P.? Well she has a new novel coming out in March called Help Wanted, which is a workplace kind of story about a group of box-store workers in Upstate New York and the conditions they face. Adelle is a thoughtful author and I got to do a Q&A with her for PW, see that here. To research her novel, she actually worked at a box-store for about six months and found her co-workers hardworking and funny, but the conditions they faced were pretty unstable and hard to make a living doing.

Also I just came upon a Jan. 2 article in The Post by Stephanie Merry titled “When should you give up on a book? Readers weigh in.” I think it says a lot of readers give a book about 50 pages before deciding whether to stick with it or not. Though some readers bail after a couple of sentences, while others slog through a book to the bitter end. What is your rule of thumb for whether to keep on going with a book?

I must admit I’m usually a “slogger” and I rarely DNF books once I decide to pick them up. Ugh, I know It’s crazy — life is short etc. — but if you do enough research on what you’re going to read beforehand and what appeals to you, then you often don’t run into situations where you dislike a book so much to discontinue it. But once in a blue moon you will, and then it’s either bail or slog. I often think the book might get better so I should stick with it, which perhaps is just wishful thinking, though it can come true occasionally.

And now I’ll leave you with a review of a novel that I finished at the start of the year.

The Guest by Emma Cline / Random House / 304 pages / 2023

4.2 stars. Emma Cline is a master of outsider protagonists who do bad things — the antiheroes. I loved this one: it’s dark, edgy and unsettling — about a 22-year-old girl (Alex) who’s broke and has left the city and an N.Y. apartment full of roommates and a guy named Dom she stole money from — and snagged a rich man (Simon) twice her age on Long Island. She’s living with him for a month or so in his big house with the pool and near the beach but after one false move she’s out and left to make her way with nothing but a bag with a few clothes and a spotty phone that fell in the pool.

She ingratiates herself with a guy or two and bums a couple places to stay. She plans just to stay afloat for a week till she’ll crash Simon’s Labor Day party and try to get back together with him. But until then, she’s left to meander the gated places she’s not a part of. Meanwhile she’s scared that Dom, the guy she stole money from is after her. Along the way, she gets entangled with those she imposes on and leaves a line of destruction in her wake.

This is a fast read. One that stays with you after the last pages turn. Alex has some good sides and bad sides about her that was hard to turn away from. I probably liked the novel a bit more than others on Goodreads since its overall rating is just 3.34. This rating might be because Alex is sort of conniving and the story is a bit dark. Still to me, Cline puts you right there and takes you with this person, barely getting by, who you want to see not fail, despite her not being very likable. Maybe I liked the novel a smidge more than Cline’s 2016 debut novel The Girls, about a young girl who gets caught up in a cult in 1969 California, which was good but creepy. Cline’s still only 34 and a talent to watch.

That’s all for now. What about you — have you read this author and what did you think?

Hi All. It’s time to take a look back at my reading for 2023 and see how I did and what I liked. It’s a bit weird but in terms of stats I would say it was sort of an off-year for me. I think because we moved in 2023 and were fixing and selling the old house and trying to renovate the new one, my head and time for reading were a bit skewed. I listened to many audios while I was driving the hour back and forth between the city and the rural place. Luckily in the end, it worked out and the move was completed and it’s been a happy change. So LoL that’s my qualifier.

Also I’m often a mood reader so it’s interesting to see what I picked up this year. I don’t plan much in advance. It looks like I still need to read more diverse authors and books from other countries, not to mention more nonfiction? Nah, fiction is my favorite. But I like that I read many new-to-me authors and they broadened my horizons. And now without fewer adieu, here are my stats and favorites for 2023.

Stats: 60 books completed & reviewed
Fiction — 50
Nonfiction — 10
Female authors — 46
Male authors — 14
White authors — 48
Non-White authors — 13
Print books — 28
Audiobooks — 32
American authors — 34
Canadian authors — 9
British authors — 4
Irish authors — 3
French authors — 2
Australian authors — 3
Brazilian author — 1
Turkish author —1
German author — 1
Malaysian author — 1
Zambian/African authors — 1

Favorite Fiction

1) Demon Copperhead was an epic read for me. It’s gritty but how Kingsolver weaves her Appalachian tale along the lines of the Dickens classic is nothing less than remarkable.
2) I was pleased to finally get to Gil Adamson’s The Outlander from 2007, which transported me with its journey of a female fugitive on the run in 1903.
3) The Nightbitch surprised me with its darkly funny and satirical look of a harried first-time mother on the brink … transforming into something feral.
4) In the past, I’ve been drawn in by Mary Lawson’s storytelling, and her tales set in small hamlets in northern Ontario hit the heart. A Town Called Solace is my favorite of hers.
5) The Light Pirate surprised me early in 2023 with its strong page-turning tale of climate change run amok in Florida.
6) Yellowface turned into my fun audio of the summer with its clever rendering and diabolical narrator that wouldn’t let go.
7) I had to listen to This Other Eden twice through to fully grasp it but found myself taken in by its lyrical passages and the terrible displacement of the people on the island.
8) Small Mercies is a powerful gritty crime novel set in Boston in 1974. The strong character of Mary Pat Fennessey blew me out of the water.
9) Fiona McFarlane is a new favorite Australian author whose two novels I read this year. Her unsettling tale The Night Guest about an elderly woman’s care didn’t disappoint.
10) The Personal Librarian is historical fiction that introduced me to the real life story of Bella da Costa Greene whose courage and life were amazing and challenging.
11) Eastbound is a novella that drew me in with its intense circumstances of two people in flight on the Trans-Siberian railway.
12) Study for Obedience is a very strange novel with a solitary narrator who is an off-kilter mess. But her unsettling circumstances stuck with me for quite a while after.

Favorite Debut Novels
1) Nightbitch by Rachel Yoder (2021)
2) Trespasses by Louise Kennedy (2022)
3) The Night Guest by Fiona McFarlane (2013)
4) Memphis by Tara M. Stringfellow (2022)
5) Lucky Red by Claudia Cravens (2023)
6) Go As a River by Shelley Read (2023)
7) City Under One Roof by Irish Yamashita (2023)
8) Maame by Jessica George (2023)
9) This Bird Has Flown by Susanna Hoffs (2023)

Favorite Memoirs /Biographies
1) Don’t Tell Anybody the Secrets I Told You by Lucinda Williams (2023)
2) The Churchill Sisters: The Extraordinary Lives of Winton and Clementine’s Daughters by Rachel Trethewey (2021)
3) On Hitler’s Mountain: Overcoming the Legacy of a Nazi Childhood by Irmgard A. Hunt (2005)
4) You Could Make This a Beautiful Place by Maggie Smith (2023)
5) Better Living Through Birding: Notes From a Black Man in the World by Christian Cooper (2023)
6) Run Towards the Danger by Sarah Polley (2022)
7) Left on Tenth by Delia Ephron (2022)

Classics
1) Giovanni’s Room by James Baldwin (1956)
2) My Antonia by Willa Cather (1918)
3) The Fire Next Time by James Baldwin (1963)

Favorite Crime novels
1) Small Mercies by Dennis Lehane (2023)
2) I Have Some Questions for You by Rebecca Makkai (2023)
3) Chain-Gang All-Stars by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah (2023)
4) The Last Ranger by Peter Heller (2023)
5) City Under One Roof by Iris Yamashita (2023)

Coming-of-Age Fiction
1) The Rachel Incident by Caroline O’Donoghue (2023)
2) Lucky Red by Claudia Cravens (2023)
3) Maame by Jessica George (2023)

Historical Fiction
1) The Personal Librarian by Marie Bennedict & Victoria Christopher Murray
2) This Other Eden by Paul Harding
3) The Island of Missing Trees by Elif Shafak
4) The Postcard by Anne Berest
5) The Sleeping Car Porter by Suzette Mayr
6) Hang the Moon by Jeannette Walls

That’s all for now. What about you — have you read any of these and what did you think?