Books Read in August

I’m having the hardest time coming up with the summary for this month’s reading.  So you can just read for yourself.

Read
Skeletons at the Feast
Chris Bohjalian
I enjoy Bohjalian’s books because every time he manages to come though with a good, solid story that I have trouble putting down. His descriptions are vivid enough that I remember scenes years later and he also is quite prolific.

Take a Prussian aristocratic sugar beet farming family, a Scottish POW, a Jewish man hiding undercover as a German soldier and female concentration camp prisoner. Follow all of them as they flee west to escape the invading Russian army.

This book doesn’t shy away from the horrors of war, so at times it can be graphic. Overall, probably one of the better books I’ve read this year.

Dating Big Bird
Laura Zigman
I have no desire to have children and thus, was at a disadvantage with this book. The main character is obsessed with having a child. The fact that she is in a relationship with a man who wants no children, and shows no signs of changing that view, is one of the conundrums of the plot.

I couldn’t relate to the main character. I found the story annoying. I found the writing style in which the author repeatedly uses:
Many very short.
Sentences like this.
Over and over.
Again.
to be very distracting. The plot point at the end of the book, which is the catalyst for change in the protagonist’s life, I found to be entirely unbelievable. Why not just have her win the lottery? And the last chapter? Total cop-out.

There was nothing redeeming about this book and only an incredibly lazy day got me to finish this book. I was too lazy to start a new one. Not recommended.

The Permaculture Way: practical steps to creating a self-sustaining world
Graham Bell
The author does start with the world view of permaculture, spending the first third of the book discussing people and capital and discovering your own skills. Part two begins with your home and moves outwards. There is also discussion about gardening, orchards, agriculture and aquaculture as well as good lists of plants and their uses in the back.

Three Girls and Their Brother
Theresa Rebeck
When this arrived at the library for me I had a moment of puzzlement as to why I would have requested this particular novel. The cover is a bit off-putting. But two paragraphs in, I was hooked. Goodreads tells me I heard about this book from Deborah. Thank goodness she is my friend on Goodreads. Now I’m curious as to what she had to say about it, but I’m going to write my review before I read hers.

The voices in this story make this book. Particularly, the voice of the brother, Phillip, aged fifteen, who begins our adventure. Listen to this quote, where Phillip is meeting a famous middle-aged movie star for the first time. Polly is his 17 year-old sister.

“…looking like Henry the Eighth with one arm stretched out along the back of the banquette and the other arm around Polly, his hand discreetly stuck down the back of her pants. It was spooky, really; he looked just like he looks in the movies, where he’s always waving a giant weapon, and he looked really short. That’s something I never considered, when I thought about meeting movie stars. Usually, when you see them? They’re like four stories tall, on some giant movie screen somewhere. But when you meet them in person? They’re actually just sort of people-sized. Which makes the whole experience kind of surreal, if you haven’t thought about things like that ahead of time. Plus, if the guy has his hand down your sister’s pants, he looks significantly less like a movie star, and more like your average asshole.”

I could read an entire book with just Phillip talking, but we leave him soon after his three sisters become “it” girls–just three more girls famous at first for their red hair and their beauty, then later famous for being famous. After we hear Phillip’s view, then each of the sisters tells us a little more of the story, from their point of view. What happens to the four of them is fascinating, funny and shocking. I couldn’t help thinking of real-life “it” girls and wondering how many of them had similar experiences.

I would love to live in a society where sensible adults never let young people be pimped out to the the media like this, but in this book, it is the adults who do the dealing of flesh–and reap the rewards each time the girls are sold.

ps. A book with La Aura as a main character? Also something I would read. Please Ms. Rebeck, please?

Abraham Lincoln: a novel life
Tony Wolk
I enjoyed the premise of this book: What if Abraham Lincoln was suddenly transported from February 1865 to Easter Sunday 1955? Written by a Portland State University professor, it wasn’t a book I had to finish, but it kept me reading. I especially enjoyed reading the notes on historical figures at the end of the book.

Second Nature: A Gardener’s Education
Michael Pollan
I love Michael Pollan’s writing, but one of the things I love about it was the very thing that made this book so hard to finish. Pollan’s writing style is dense and thoughtful. This can be a good thing when one is in the mood to read a dense and thoughtful text, but sometimes his observations can go on. I would have been better off owning this book, so I could pick it up and put it down intermittently over a large amount of time. However, I requested it from the library which meant my time with it was quite short. I had to set reading goals to get through it, which I hated, because as far as I’m concerned prose this well written should be savored. So, a rare call to all to purchase this book, not to get it from the library.

Everyone Worth Knowing
Lauren Weisberger
One wonders, (at least I do) upon reading this book if Lauren Weisberger is the secret consumer of romance novels that her main character is. This book is, despite the striking cover, hip New York setting and rampant name dropping, essentially just that: a romance novel. Someone should explore when books cross over the “romance novel line.” This doesn’t have the bodice ripper cover, but all the elements were there. Entirely predictable, this was not a bad way to spend a summer afternoon, but not much more than that.

The People of Sparks
Jeanne DuPrau
I enjoyed this book even more than The City of Ember, mostly due to the fact that there isn’t a movie version to have seen first, as there was with Ember. Once again, DuPrau tackles tough issues in an entirely readable way. As I read further into the book, I wondered what her views on illegal immigration might be; this story would be a good springboard for discussing that contemporary issue with teenagers. Recommended.

Started but did not finish
Painting Ruby Tuesday
Jane Yardley
This book had promise, set both in the 60s in England and present day New York/London, but the amount of characters and the density of the text was a bit overwhelming for my summer reading, vacation mind.

Must Love Dogs: a Novel
Claire Cook.
I gave up on this. If I had to finish it, I could, but it suffered from the movie being such a true adaptation of the book. Had I not seen the film version, I would read to the end to find out what happened. Since I saw the movie, I have a good idea how this book ends and thus, am not really interested in it.

Edible Estates: attack on the front lawn
Fritz Haeg, Diana Balmori & others
This book had some good ideas in it and the essays I read were interesting. Not interesting enough to read them all, but still. The pictures are good.

The Best Apples to Buy and Grow
Beth Hanson, ed.
I checked this out as part of the “build a Belgian fence” project that is still in the planning stage. But I have decided to narrow my apple choices down a bit before diving into this book.

Apples for the 21st Century
Warren Manhart
This book has several contributors. Once I realized that one of them was Glen Andresen, who taught a “Growing Fruit” class I attended last winter, I just read his entries. This book was also part of the “build a Belgian fence” project that is still in the planning stages.

Little House on the Prairie
Laura Ingalls Wilder
Darn it, the library has over ten copies of this book that is half a century old. And people keep requesting it. So back it goes.

Did not even start
Watering Systems for Lawn and Garden: a do it yourself guide
R. Dodge Woodson

Permaculture Plants: a selection
Nugent & Boniface

Grafting and Budding: a practical guide for fruit and nut plants and ornamental
W. J. Lewis & D. McE. Alexander
I’ll look into this book later.

75 remarkable fruits for your garden
Jack Staub

Handbook of Edible Weeds
James A. Duke