Okay, maybe “mania” is a little bit of an overstatement. I don’t read nearly as quickly as I used to, and I don’t seem to have had much time to read lately, so this list contains only a paltry four books. But in my defense, the book I just finished—the third one on the list below—was something like 550 pages long. (Actually, 560. I just checked.) And the other three are nonfiction, which always takes me longer to read than fiction does (especially since I go through long stretches during which the only fiction I read is Brit-chick-lit and mysteries. Intelligently written mysteries, mind you—and the next time I’m reading one, maybe I’ll do a roundup of the Best Mystery Writers According to Me—but still not huge brain challengers.)
Anyway. With no further excuses, herewith four books that have floated my boat recently.
1. Thomas Frank, What’s the Matter with Kansas?. I have now officially determined that I am not, in fact, the last leftist in the Yew Ess Ay to read this book, but I still wish I’d read it sooner. Yeah, Frank tends to reiterate his points just a little too much, and yeah, I’m in fundamental agreement with Michael Bérubé’s criticisms of Frank’s assessment of the culture wars. But it’s still a terrific book, and since I’m right next door to Kansas, it was an especially interesting read for me. And Frank is a skillful and engaging writer. (I love nonfiction books that have notes that are every bit as worthy of reading as the text itself.) It won’t exactly cheer anybody up, but it’s a very cogent analysis of some of the reasons that so many regular ‘muricans vote against their economic self-interest and how the wingnut establishment, political and journalistic, make sure they keep doing so.
2. Jonathan Kozol, The Shame of the Nation: The Restoration of Apartheid Schooling in America. Considerably less likely to cheer anybody up, but an essential and deeply disturbing read. Kozol comes up with so many statistics and so much research that it would be almost impossible to dispute his arguments about the state of public education and the effects of de facto resegregation on minority students in poorly funded schools. He exposes the No Child Left Behind program for the sham that it is and points out the essential cynicism at its core. And he brings to life some exceptional children who are, in fact, being left behind by the resegregation of public schools. A good polemic can be a real inspiration to its readers, and that’s exactly what this book is, an excellent and impassioned polemic, like his other books; Kozol isn’t a particularly good prose stylist, but he doesn’t have to be, because what he has to say is so compelling by itself that his plain writing style works just fine. It’s a massively frustrating read, because you want to do something, anything after reading it, and it’s not clear what any one individual can do, particularly one who, like me, doesn’t have kids. And sadly, I wasn’t terribly surprised by any of Kozol’s facts and statistics—just disappointed and troubled.
3. Audrey Niffenegger, The Time Traveler’s Wife. I admit that I had to get past my knee-jerk snobbery when I got the paperback edition of this magnificent debut novel out of the library and saw that it was both a Today Show Book Club choice and a People magazine book of the year…and you should too, because it’s a really remarkable book. Clare and Henry are a Chicago couple, eight years apart in age. He’s a librarian, she’s an artist. They are normal (I use the word here in the sense of “more or less like me,” not to mean “ordinary”) intelligent people with good taste in music and books and food and friends…and oh yeah, Henry just happens to time-travel, unpredictably and uncontrollably, both backward and forward in time; he sometimes even meets an older or younger version of himself. (He has “chrono-displacement disorder,” which the author treats as a real syndrome.) Clare first meets him when she is six and Henry is in his forties (since he hops around so much in time, he is sometimes much more than eight years older than she is), in the meadow near her family’s house in South Haven, Michigan, and he writes down all the dates when he will return. He’s reluctant to tell her much about what’s going to happen in their future, but she eventually learns that they’ll get married. It’s a love story. The story jumps around in time in somewhat the same way that Henry does, and all of it is delightful, though some of it is also heartbreaking. Niffenegger is a terrific writer; it’s hard to believe that this is her first novel, because she’s so skillful and her writing so fluent. (And her pop-culture references rang very true to me; I suspect she’s not far from my own age.) It’s a little sentimental, and the time travel doesn’t hold up to extremely close scrutiny, but that doesn’t matter, because the characters are so charming and so real (flaws included) and the story is so full and rich. One of my favorite novels in a long time.
4. Laura Mac Donald, The Curse of the Narrows: The Halifax Disaster of 1917. This is a qualified plug, because I’m only 125 pages or so into the book. (But I read all 125 of those in the space of a few hours yesterday, and I can’t wait to get back to it tonight.) It’s about a 1917 disaster that was completely unfamiliar to me, probably because I don’t know much about Canadian history: a giant ship carrying large quantities of highly combustible explosives and gas was plowed into by another large ship in the narrow and dangerous channels of Halifax Harbour in Halifax-Dartmouth, Nova Scotia. The explosion and subsequent tsunami killed 2000 people in a city with a population of about 60,000, left 9000 people homeless, and did hundreds of millions of dollars worth of damage. I don’t know why, but I’ve always had a thing for shipwreck stories (and natural-disaster stories too, though it’s hard to imagine being able to enjoy a pure natural-disaster story right now, so soon after Katrina), and this is a remarkably good one. Mac Donald is kind of a clunky writer, but not so much so that her writing gets in the way of the story, which is so remarkable (not least because it’s amazing that anyone survived to describe the incident) that it almost tells itself.
I’m not sure what I’m going to read when I’m done with Curse of the Narrows. I have a smallish stack of books that I actually bought—something I prefer not to do with fiction—including some Brit-chick-lit, a mystery, a nicely boxed set of The Chronicles of Narnia (I still hope to re-read at least the first one before the movie comes out), and one of my three* favorite books of all time: Graham Greene’s Brighton Rock, which I haven’t read in at least ten years. I might read that one first, unless I pick up a bunch of random books at the library, which is what usually happens.
Oh, and an NPIMH (that’s “now playing in my head”): The traditional song “Moorlough Shore,” as sung by Caroline Lavelle. I’m familiar with this song because it was played repeatedly and to excellent, haunting effect on “E-Z Streets,” one of my favorite TV shows of the last decade or so, and one of the darkest ever. The Trio channel read my mind and added it to their “Brilliant But Canceled” series last fall, so I got to see most of it again for the first time in ten or twelve years or so. It didn’t make quite as strong an impression on me the second time around (probably because I’ve since seen even darker shows, like “The Wire”), but it was still very powerful…even though the idea of Ken Olin (who looks remarkably like my oldest brother, at least in some shots) as an Irish Catholic is pretty comical. Anyway, the pilot was on again a few weeks ago, and I was finally able to catch enough of the lyrics to the song to make a reasonable Google search out of it. I tracked the song title down that way, and then looked the song up at Allmusic.com, which listed only three recordings of it. A little trial and error led me to the correct version, by Ms. Lavelle, an English cellist and singer of whom I was previously unaware, even though she’s sung with Massive Attack and I was something of a fan of theirs for a while. Some reviews compared her to Enya (yikes!), but then I saw others that explained why that wasn’t a reasonable comparison, so I bought a used copy of “Spirit,” the CD that “Moorlough Shore” appears on. Most of it is a little too trippy and ethereal to qualify as My Thing (though mercifully, she doesn’t sound anything like Enya), but I’ve been listening to “Moorlough Shore” over and over and over again. She has a beautiful, dusky, low voice, and the weird cello and her eerie vocal make it a very distinctive and completely haunting treatment of a traditional song. She’s got a record on eMusic that has more of the traditional stuff, so I might grab that, I guess. Not sure I’ll ever become a real fan, but the CD was well worth the purchase price just for the one song alone.
*One of my three favorite books of all time is actually three books, so I guess I should say my favorite five books of all time. The three are the books in Edna O’Brien’s “Country Girls” trilogy: The Country Girls, The Lonely Girl, and Girls in Their Married Bliss. (Just typing the titles makes me want to read them again.) And the remaining one of the five is Jane Smiley’s A Thousand Acres. In case anyone was wondering.
I gave my mom the Jonathan Kozol book for her birthday–she’s a former public school teacher and a big fan of Kozol. The Tuscaloosa city school system is a classic case of resegregation. As soon as the court order that forced integration (and resulted in one large high school with two campuses, one for 9-10 grades and one for 11-12) ended, the city built two brand new “neighborhood” high schools (that aren’t in neighborhoods). Guess what kind of neighborhood got to keep the old school (the school that is now something like 95% minority)? Ultimately, the city has caved to pressure from the west side citizens and is building a new high school for the in-town/west side kids, too. Lucky for the city that they’re able to divert attention from the real issue by doing so.
I haven’t read any of your three/five favorite books. I’m curious about the O’Brien trilogy. I think I ought to like her, but I was underwhelmed by the novel I read, Wild Decembers. Do you think this means I just don’t like her, or should I try something else?
I just finished Myla Goldberg’s new novel, Wickett’s Remedy. It’s no Bee Season, but it’s good. I have nothing articulate to say about why.
I had to go look up Wild Decembers to see which Edna O’Brien book it was—it’s one of the few I haven’t read. But it’s a recent one, and though I’ve liked some of her recent work, it’s been a lot more hit or miss than the earlier stuff. Oddly, she’s worn her James Joyce influence on her sleeve more as her career has progressed, rather than less. The books in the Country Girls trilogy were her first, and they’re pretty autobiographical (most of her books have some autobiographical elements, but those three are the most clearly about her own life). I don’t know that I can comment objectively on them, because the Irish thing makes them especially appealing to me, and because I’ve read them so many times that they’re like part of my body…but they’re pretty amazing books. You might try ‘em. A lot of her other books are also well worth reading, especially Night and the short-story collection A Fanatic Heart, but I don’t know if I’d have appreciated any of her later work as much if I hadn’t started with the Country Girls books.
And believe it or not, I still haven’t read The Bee Season. I’m going to the library tonight, so maybe I’ll finally remember to look for it.
You should definitely pick up Bee Season. It’s marvelous, another remarkable first novel. If you’re still thinking a lot about faith and belief, you’ll find it especially affecting, I think. I was compelled to read the history of Jewish mysticism that Goldberg cites as a source as soon as I finished the novel. (I didn’t make it through the whole history text–too dry and academic–but the subject matter was fascinating).
I’ll try the Coutnry Girls books. The Irish thing is the reason I think I should like her. Speaking of which, have you heard the band Danú? I just downloaded one of their albums from iTunes and like the instrumental pieces a lot. I’m always a little put off by the vocalists in Irish bands (the ones who play “Irish” music, I mean)–too clean and NPR-sounding, or something. The woman who fronts Danú sounds a lot like Maura O’Connell. Anyway, you might like them. I’ve been searching for some good (traditaion sounding, not like Enya) Irish music lately and not having much luck. Any suggestions?
Sorry to ramble on your blog. Avoiding dull web work…
You’re the second person whose taste I trust to recommend The Bee Season to me. I just put it on hold at the library (didn’t make it there today, but I have to get there sometime this week because the Jonathan Kozol book is weeks overdue—I think of library fines as my way of supporting our public library system, but I have to draw the line somewhere). I hadn’t noticed the cover before—looks like it was designed to resemble Webster’s dictionary. Clever.
I guess I didn’t know that you had an Irish thing. It’s the story of my life, you know. I have heard Danúu. I’ve got two of their records, in fact, though I see they have a new one out this year, and I haven’t picked that one up yet. Their singer, Muireann Nic Amhlaoibh (I’d mention that I can pronounce that, but that would be showing off
), is wonderful. She’s only been with them for the last two records—before that, they had a male singer whom I also liked a lot. If you like them, you absolutely have to check out Arcady; I don’t think they’re around anymore, but they recorded two albums with Niamh Parsons singing, and she’s arguably my favorite Irish singer of all. Her solo stuff is also very good, though a little inconsistent—”Blackbirds and Thrushes,” her best album, is pretty close to perfect, though.
Then there’s Solas, whose first two records (the self-titled one and “Sunny Spells and Scattered Showers”) are indispensible. They’re still around, but there are only two people left from the original band. (The two who are left are exceptionally talented, as all the original members were, but as a band, they’re just not what they used to be.) Their original vocalist, Karan Casey, has put out four solo records, and I can unequivocally recommend the first one, “Songlines.” She’s moved away from traditional stuff a little bit recently, which is disappointing, though she still has one of the world’s great voices. Her former bandmate John Doyle—the best rhythm guitarist in the world at the moment—has two solo records out, both mixing trad and more contemporary folk (he does a killer version of Jean Ritchie’s “Blue Diamond Mines” on his first record—not as good as Phyllis Boyens’s classic version, but still great). Not strictly trad, but still highly recommended. He’s got a lovely voice—quiet, but very distinctive.
Oh, and I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention Altan, the sine qua non of Irish traditional bands. Everything they do is great, but their greatest hits record is a good place to start.
I could go on, and will, quite happily (Cherish the Ladies, Patrick Street, Capercaille, Old Blind Dogs, and many more…), but those are my favorites of the purely trad crowd.
Feel free to ramble any old time, btw. I’m avoiding moderately interesting Web work right now myself…at 8:45 at night. Sigh.
Thanks for all the Irish music recommendations! I have one Altan cd, Runaway Sunday, and I like it a lot. I’m always reluctant to take a chance on Irish music–because it could turn out to be Enya! I never thought I would like buying music from iTunes, but I’ve been converted by the ability to listen to clips and then attain instant gratification. I don’t really need any more physical objects, and I’m not enough of an audiophile to be bothered by whatever the quality difference is between cd and mp3 (mp4, whatever it is).
You didn’t know I had an Irish thing… That must mean I haven’t bragged to you about the time I accompanied one of my professors to the ACIS/CAIS conference in Belfast, where I met Seamus Heaney (shook his hand even!) and got to attend a wonderful reading by Heaney and Michael Longley. As Meg’s research assistant, I got to go with her to the home of Michael and Grainne Yeats to look at some WB Yeats manuscripts they had in their basement (!). This was probably the most thrilling thing I’ve ever done, or am ever likely to do, in my entire life. While no one was looking, I snapped a picture of Yeats’s lapis lazuli (displayed on a chest in a hallway). One of the days we were at the Yeats’s, Anne Yeats was also there. My favorite of the Yeats was Grainne–a spitfire of a septuagenarian with a gorgeous voice. Meg convinced her to sing for us, but I wasn’t lucky enough to get a harp concert. If I had thought I had more experiences like that to look forward to, it may have been more difficult for me to bail on the PhD. But Meg is a second-generation academic, and her in with the Yeats is through her father, who made friends with Michael Yeats while he was editing Yeats’s “Vision Papers.” Alas, I have no in with literary royalty of any sort, and the typical sort of literary “research” (blech, hate the encroachment of [pseudo]science on the humanities) is deadly dull.
I do love Ireland and things Irish. I really want to go back there.
Ack! Neglected to close that em tag. Sorry for the italic overload!
I closed the tag for you. Beyond that, I am too speechless with jealousy at your Heaney and Yeats stories to comment further.
I’ve had an Irish thing since I was about 16, and I’ve still never been to Ireland, apart from a half-day spent in Dublin between planes the very first time I went to London. Sigh.