Wednesday, November 02, 2011

The Lost Books of The Odyssey: A Novel

The Lost Books of The Odyssey: A NovelThe Lost Books of The Odyssey: A Novel by Zachary Mason

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This is a beautiful collection of tone poems and evocative scenes inspired by the Odyssey. Those looking for a through-composed novel will be disappointed. The collection of stories explores Odysseus and a multitude of other characters and events from both the Iliad and the Odyssey. Author, Mason, demonstrates a deep love for and knowledge of these old stories, both the tales in the "official" version we all read in high school, and those apocryphal tales that survived many generations of oral and written tradition. The overall effect of the book is a haunting, poetic interpretation of a classic that has deep roots in Western culture.



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Saturday, October 22, 2011

What's It All About?: Philosophy and the Meaning of Life

What's It All About?: Philosophy and the Meaning of LifeWhat's It All About?: Philosophy and the Meaning of Life by Julian Baggini

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This was the very first philosophy book I'd ever read. It's a challenge for me to rate it, both because I have no other books of its kind to use as comparison, and because much of my positive experience with the book came from reading it with my husband, and the lively discussions it spurred.

The book worked well as an introduction to philosophy because it led with an exciting and fascinating question, then approached the answer by using reasoning techniques and explaining the techniques as we went. To illustrate points Baggini used a healthy mix of commonplace references that held meaning for me, and quotes or core ideas from other philosophers. So the book served as a very gentle introduction to influential philosophers, as well.

This book got me truly excited about a subject that previously held no interest for me. Four stars for explaining what philosophy is (and the meaning of life, too!), and one star of excellence held back for that amazingly awesome philosophy book I hope to read in the future.



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Wednesday, October 05, 2011

Redirect: The Surprising New Science of Psychological Change

Redirect: The Surprising New Science of Psychological ChangeRedirect: The Surprising New Science of Psychological Change by Timothy D. Wilson

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Interesting and practical, a book that really changed the way I think about the thought patterns that motivate behavior. The focus of the book is "story editing," rewriting (redirecting) the stories we tell ourselves about who we are, what we can do, and how we feel. Wilson offers story editing as a tool for both personal and societal positive change.

Although I would have preferred that the book focus even more on how to effect change on a personal level, several techniques suggested for supporting personal growth and happiness are already a part of my everyday life. For the first time I actually look forward to keeping a journal, and am able to see writing not just as a form of expression and communication, but as a tool for well-being. On a practical, personal level, Wilson also offers useful parenting techniques.

I felt Wilson's true passion in this book was explaining how to improve the effectiveness of social programs intended to benefit disadvantaged students, children, and families with issues like drug/alcohol abuse, teenaged pregnancy, child abuse, minority marginalization, and poor school performance. Wilson had two points. First and foremost, that a "common sense" approach to helping alleviate these problems is well-intended but may not help, and may actually make the problems worse. It is important to ask the question "does this [intervention] work?" He really pounded on the idea of submitting interventions to study, emphasizing that control groups are essential to proving that a program works, as an individual's experience in an intervention is not a reliable measure of its effectiveness. Wilson also suggested that applying the story editing technique, changing the way at risk individuals perceive who they are, what they can do, and how they feel, may be a useful way to approach intervention design.

I feel that by asking "does this work?" and researching to find the answer, I can make much better choices in the future when donating to charity.



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Monday, September 26, 2011

The Unincorporated War

Unincorporated WarUnincorporated War by Dani Kollin

My rating: 1 of 5 stars


Avatars, personal incorporation, battle fatigue, mind control, a controversial view on the return of religion: this book had so many interesting ideas, which is probably why I was extra disappointed by the storytelling. I did not enjoy the storytelling because I could not engage with the characters.

Characters in the book felt like engineered aspects of the author's premise. Never for one moment did I feel as though the characters had any life of their own. In most cases characters were completely black and white- the bad guys acted like total jerks, the good guys were total goody two shoes. And it was not unusual for a character to suddenly pop up (even 3/4 of the way through the narrative) just long enough to give a long info dump on their whole life's history, be used to forward the plot, and then get conveniently killed off or simply forgotten about, and never enter into the story again. I felt like the characters were narrative tools, not people, and I could not and did not care about them at all.

Toward the climax of the book, the action did get quite exciting and engage my attention. It was almost like a tragic opera, announcing in advance what was going to happen, then letting the reader bite nails as the foreshadowed dramatic events unfolded. Unfortunately the denouement took the edge off the exciting conclusion by backpedaling and calling into question the finality of the climax. And to add insult to injury, it ended with a big old "to be continued."



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Tuesday, September 20, 2011

Everything Beautiful Began After

Everything Beautiful Began AfterEverything Beautiful Began After by Simon Van Booy

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This book had two rare distinctions for me: 1. only fiction book in which I highlighted lots passages that really struck me; 2. only book I have disliked in the middle only to find out that all the uncomfortable stuff was necessary to a good ending.
The book begins a little like a French novel, or Truffaut film. The middle sections dive into post modern 2nd person narrative, with lots of images of typewritten correspondence (it was this section that I found jarring and uncomfortable).
I was not surprised when I learned that Simon Van Booy is also the author of several philosophy books. This novel was an exploration of what it means to live- not just to survive, but to love, grow, and thrive. When the author states his thesis, he is often forced to use words that ring hollow to me: destiny, fate, God, meaning. Then he uses the characters he has breathed to life to play out the thesis, with beautiful attention to the detail of their experience. Those characters, those details, really spoke to me.
My biggest complaint would be that the narrative suggests that there is some endpoint, some place of completion in which characters have grown into their full potential. For narrative purposes there is something harmonious and satisfying at having that endpoint. But I suspect that the philosophical thesis would be more correct admitting that no person, no character, is ever truly finished.



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Sunday, September 11, 2011

Wonderland: The Zen of Alice

Wonderland: The Zen of AliceWonderland: The Zen of Alice by Daniel Doen Silberberg

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


Silberberg writes that after enlightenment, the Buddha did not think there was any way to teach the path to others, or even to put what he had experienced into words. Then he tried, anyway. Silberberg does much the same with this book on Zen. He admits there is no way to transmit his knowledge directly, like a how-to manual. Instead, he uses every method he can think of in a genuine attempt to spread the benefit of what he has learned. He uses personal anecdotes, Zen koans and stories, and, yes, even uses a little Alice in Wonderland to get his message across. As can be expected, some of these methods resonated with me more than others. Readers looking for a walk-through course on Buddhism organized around the adventures of Alice will be disappointed. But those familiar with Wonderland will see it used as one of several methods to describe something but can't be described. Silberberg does a good job of trying, anyway.



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Monday, August 22, 2011

Mistborn: The Final Empire

Mistborn: The Final Empire (Mistborn, #1)Mistborn: The Final Empire by Brandon Sanderson

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


Three stars means I liked it. This was an entertaining fantasy read that at times really held my attention and made me look forward to finding out what happened next. The magic of the world was satisfying in complexity and internal logic. Characters had sufficient background depth and motivation. Overall pacing was exciting. For some reason all these elements didn't come together to make magic for me. Everything was well crafted and well executed, but I was always aware that I was reading an invented story about imaginary characters in an imaginary world. I was never able to achieve total suspension of disbelief and feel as though the world was a place I could really go play, the characters old friends, the story a tale I'd heard long ago, then forgotten. My personal favorite fantasies make me feel as though I've actually lived them, and I know in my gut I've never really been to the Final Empire.



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Thursday, July 21, 2011

The Astral: A Novel

The Astral: A NovelThe Astral: A Novel by Kate Christensen

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


The Astral is all about experiencing life as it is, and everything from the plot, to characters, setting, and writing style beautifully convey the novel's theme. The book is set in Brooklyn. Having lived there, I felt Christensen did an excellent job of capturing the texture of real daily life in the borough. Her protagonist, a poet, prides himself on the fact that his poetry celebrates reality, that the only way he knows to live is by honestly, fully experiencing the reality of his days. The crisis at the beginning of the novel (getting kicked out by his wife in retribution for an affair he did not have) sets him on the path to discovering that he has been avoiding certain parts of his daily experience, building a fantasy of family life and marriage that either never existed or had already collapsed by the arrival of the crisis. Christensen's characters are are real and three dimensional, although a few (particularly James) feel more like foils for the protagonist and tools of the narrative than living breathing people.

Best of all, I love the ending of this book. There is a climax, a definitive ending to the story between the protagonist and his relationship to the life he believed he was living. But the denouement (where many books fall flat for me) is a beautiful admission that our experience is a delicate balance between the stories we tell ourselves, and our perception of the nuts and bolts of the world around us, which have their own transcendent radiance, no matter how well-worn or shabby.



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Monday, July 18, 2011

Incognito

Incognito: The Secret Lives of the BrainIncognito: The Secret Lives of the Brain by David Eagleman

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


Incognito started out strong as a generalist's introduction to recent advances in the study of cognition. The author's enthusiasm for his subject was contagious, and he wrote with a great balance between explaining the subject and illustrating points with interesting case studies. Near the end of the book the author's thesis veered from general interest in cognition, to a passionate case for altering the criminal justice system. The end of the book really went wild, becoming more and more off tone and off topic from earlier chapters.



Eagleman explored the justice system by making an interesting case for punishment based on reformability instead of culpability. He began with extreme examples of brain damaged criminals physically incapable of controlling their violent behavior, and stated that it was cruel to punish such criminals, as they were not able to change their own behavior in response to the punishment. So far, so good.



Then my skin began to crawl as Eagleman extended the definition of brain damage to include criminals who had genetic tendencies toward depression, had suffered lead poisoning as children, or were raised in abusive households. The goosebumps did not come from the idea of a society in which crime goes unpunished- Eagleman was careful to state he intended to contain and/or behaviorally recondition all offenders to protect the general populace. I was creeped out by the broad definition of brain damage (nearly any history of physical or emotional trauma of significance qualifies you as brain damaged by Eagleman's definition). And if a criminal is identified as brain damaged, the idea of their correctional reconditioning was also creepy and ill-defined. The lobotomy as correctional reconditioning, Eagleman concluded, was no longer a socially acceptable form of reconditioning. That leaves correctional therapists with drugs and other shadowy brain reprogramming techniques to reshape criminal brains. Yikes.



Further, Eagleman hopefully anticipated a future when brain scans are used during sentencing to help determine the extent of a criminal's brain damage. Based on the scan, the criminal would be diverted to either punishment, correctional behavioral reconditioning, or indefinite containment. Eagleman claimed that taking the human element out of sentencing, and replacing it with science, would take the cruelty out of the justice system and make it more efficient. I think his hope for the future looks like a nightmare scenario rife with potential for abuse. The best biometric scans of the future will provide a stream of information that will be interpreted by human brain scientists, or by programs written by human brain scientists. That means the human element would still be alive and well, rife with prejudice, corruption, self-interest, and pressure from exigency (hmm, these results could go either way, but our reconditioning facility is overcrowded...). And the worst part would be, the justice system and our whole society would be pretending that we were perfectly impartial, purely scientific. Giving human foibles the face of absolute, impartial legitimacy is a dangerous, frightening, and downright threatening vision of a future criminal justice system.



And to end this book with a truly crazy bang, Eagleman knocked Occam's Razor, and made some pretty broad claims about science in general that I don't have the scientific background to agree with or dispute. But the remarks seemed quite off topic and out of keeping with the rest of the the book.



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Friday, July 08, 2011

Murder Past Due

Murder Past Due  (A Cat in the Stacks Mystery, #1)Murder Past Due by Miranda James

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


Maine Coons seem to be popular cats in fiction these days. This was a cozy whodunnit featuring a librarian and his Maine Coon cat. While the amateur detective's library skills were key to his ability to help solve the mystery, the Maine Coon cat was not. I expect the cat in a feline mystery series to be integral to the plot. Take the cat out of Murder Past Due, and you still have the exact same story.



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Friday, June 24, 2011

The Tiger's Wife

The Tiger's Wife: A NovelThe Tiger's Wife: A Novel by Téa Obreht

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This was a very rare case of a book I planned to give three stars, but was so impressed by the ending, that I upped it to four. So often I'm loving a book, only to be disappointed by a clumsy ending, or an overly explained ending that takes something magical and tries to make it concrete, reducing it to dust with the heavy hammer of rationalization. The Tiger's Wife built up a beautiful, crumbling, European folklore ambiance. It blended past with present, reality with fantasy. Most importantly, it explored what it means to find and hold onto humanity in a world of loss and death and horror. Obreht captured the magic that is our willingness to find a sense of wonder in a world of senseless violence and aching loss. And she was able to blend reality with magic, magic with reality, in a memorable and beautiful way.



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Tuesday, June 14, 2011

Unfamiliar Fishes

Unfamiliar FishesUnfamiliar Fishes by Sarah Vowell

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


As always, Sarah Vowell's enthusiasm for her subject succeeded in getting me excited about history- this time about the history of Hawaii. I listened to the book read by the author to get the full effect of Vowell's deadpan humor. I came away from the book intrigued by whale oil and sugar, and, for the first time in my life, excited about reading Moby Dick. Some Cherokee blood runs in Vowell's veins, and she makes a very personal connection to the fate of the native Hawaiians who lost their land and lives to the unfamiliar fishes that washed up on their shores. If anything, her genuine feeling for the loss of the Hawaiian way of life saps a little of her normal humor, takes just a little of the edge off her funny, sarcastic voice.



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Sunday, June 12, 2011

Zen and the Art of Faking It

Zen And The Art Of Faking ItZen And The Art Of Faking It by Jordan Sonnenblick

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


Good book. Sonnenblick was able to use techniques I'm familiar with from Drums, Girls & Dangerous Pie to create a completely different protagonist. As I neared the end, I was really hoping there would be no neat ends, tying everything up, resolving all the protagonist's problems- because that would not be appropriate to this protagonist. Although not all the loose ends were cheerfully tied, I would have liked to see just a few more left loose. To me that would have taken the story from good to great.



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Saturday, June 04, 2011

The Dream of Perpetual Motion

The Dream of Perpetual MotionThe Dream of Perpetual Motion by Dexter Palmer
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

A surreal, dark fantasy.  Thrilling, fascinating, horrible.  Great use of language and theme.  Beautifully brutal world-building.  Confident writing voice that can tell the reader what will happen chapters before describing the journey, heightening, not decreasing, the tension.


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A Memory of Wind

A Memory of WindA Memory of Wind by Rachel Swirsky
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Poetic retelling of Iphigenia at Aulis.  The vivid sensory detail fades as the novella progresses, but that may be less an inability to sustain, and more intentional depiction of flesh and blood girl dissolving into spirit wind.  Swirsky circles back again and again to two key familial moments in Iphigenia's life, fleshing out the memories a little at a time to emotionally coincide with the story's climax.

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Wednesday, April 20, 2011

Jennifer Egan takes Pulitzer prize | Books | guardian.co.uk

For the second year in a row my favorite book I'd read in recent months won the Pulitzer. This year was Jennifer Egan's "A Visit from the Goon Squad." Last year was "Tinkers" by Paul Harding.

Wednesday, April 06, 2011

A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan- best book I've read so far in 2011

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I love the way the characters' lives intersect and intertwine without ever really connecting. The writing style translates detailed, direct experience into clear prose. Though there is no through narrative, the constant reappearance of characters we met before in new contexts keeps things interesting.