Small Pressures

About Libraries

2011-11-06T14:09:00.000-08:00

There's an article in this week's issue of the New Yorker by the novelist, editor and literary critic James Wood about packing up his father-in-law's library after his death. The library had about 4,000 books in it, many never read, like most personal libraries. It was focused on Middle Eastern history - the collector was a French Algerian who ended up in the U.S. as a Fulbright scholar, took a stab at a PhD in Middle Eastern studies, but ultimately went into a career in business and settled in Canada.

It got me thinking about my own library. Like most aspects of my life, it is a messy, humble collection of my various interests throughout the years, some of which carried through, many of which have dropped or forgotten. I'm not a collector at heart, and I am not much of a thinker or writer, but I am a voracious reader and a good talker, my library reflects that, and I've always liked that about my collection.

The current state of my library

Over the years I have added to and subtracted from it, as most book lovers do, and so in some respects it does reflect an evolution of my thought and my reading. But it's also a dynamic area in other ways - because we live in a four-room apartment, our library is also our living room, media room, bike storage area, cat playground, dining area, and occasional guest room, and reading or collecting is not the major focus of that room. So it's difficult to keep the shelves just to books, or even get to the books sometimes. They sometimes get obscured by other items, like the collection of video games that have been stashed next to the TV, the photos and art we had no other place for, or the remains of our cat who died last year.

Curiously, some of my husband's and my books are mixed together, but some are not, and he has a couple of bookcases to himself in other areas of the house. Overall, we have about a thousand books, and there was very little duplication in our libraries when we moved in together. We didn't merge our books at all until we were married two years later, although in the case of separation it wouldn't be difficult to identify whose books were whose; mine are literary fiction, poetry, a wide range of non-fiction, and some trashy historical novels, while his are horror, fantasy, a little sci-fi, theatre, and books on the occult or spirituality. I think we just didn't merge them because we had very little interest in each other's books.

Yeah, I married this guy

I had a crisis last year when deciding whether I wanted a Kindle- among other things, I knew that it would change the character of my library. Although it's true that most people with book collections haven't read all of their books, I've purchased most of my books with the intent of reading them, as opposed to their collection value. As Woods says, while libraries are "personal," they can also be "an ideal statement of knowledge that is impersonal, [ . . .] universal, abstract, and so much larger" than the person's life. I'm not sure that is the case for mine.

It's not because I am so diligent that I have read all of my books, or that I have managed to absorb them in detailed or meaningful ways, as Woods says Susan Sontag claimed once to him about her own library. No, it's because I am a voracious but fickle reader and a bad collector, and my library is neither focused nor comprehensive in any particular area, is always in flux, and I've never made a successful effort to focus it.

I do have books that I've had for decades and may keep forever. But I'm not a sentimental person, and while books are some of the few things I can be nostalgic about, sometimes I just go through the whole thing and ruthlessly cull for the sake of space and cleanliness. Usually the castoffs are nearly worthless to a book dealer - if I'm lucky, I get enough credit to buy one new book from the whole pile; if not, they go to the Goodwill. I don't feel so bad about this now that I read about the trouble Woods had finding homes for his father-in-law's much more carefully curated collection.

It's been almost a year now since I started using my Kindle, and as expected, I haven't purchased nearly as many physical books as in previous years. And you know what? It's a huge relief.

In his article, Woods discusses the burden that the library became to him as he tried to sell it off, the burden it had become to the family who inherited it, who had begged their father to deal with it before his death. I have no heirs, and I'm only 38 years old, but my library can be a burden to me as well. A lifelong renter, I move every few years and on a shoestring budget, and the books make it very difficult. Living in apartments means making do with small space, and they take up a lot of space.

At first I was afraid to get rid of any books and replace them with ebooks - now it's comforting that books might eventually leave this place and not be replaced in my physical space. It's even possible that my collection will become less unruly and more beautiful, as I have already narrowed my physical book buying to just books where design or illustration is important, like cookbooks or art books. It could become more distilled, more meaningful to me as I probably will only keep physical books long term that I have read and loved. My Kindle is already littered with half-read or "intend to read" books, but those can easily be moved to a hard drive and stored in a drawer.

glossy magazines I read and recycle

smart magazines that I save, and my book slush pile

And then there are the magazines: Before e-readers and blogs, I was a magazine junkie. Now the New Yorker is the only paper magazine I read with any regularity, and I'll probably switch to reading that on a tablet whenever I end up getting one. I still love a few magazines, so I still subscribe to some and read them eventually, but they pile up in a way they never did before, and the subscriptions are dwindling. That made me sad for a while too, but again it is a relief now. Less to take out in the recycling bin.

I feel guilty sharing my relief. As Woods worked through his father-in-law's library, he began to believe that "our libraries perhaps say nothing very particular about us at all" because each book is a "borrowed brick" from someone else's wall, and not a particularly unique one.

I don't think I will ever live without some type of library - once a younger friend and her husband were guests in my home, and then later she thoughtlessly repeated that her husband was making jokes about the sheer number of books we owned. Apparently he had asked her a couple of years prior to get rid of most of her books (mostly leftover college books). She seemed fine with the fact that she had only one shelf of books left. One shelf! I remember blanching at the thought, imagining divorce and a midnight getaway with my cats in a U-Haul full of books and not much else. In fact, we are no longer friends - not because of that, but because of many more small, telling signals that we were not from the same planet, culture-wise.

But I can see having a haphazard, revolving door library becoming less important to me and focusing more on collecting fewer books that mean more. Unlike Woods's father-in-law, I don't have much money or much to prove. It's enough to me to have a smaller (and easier-to-move!) collection that I can enjoy. Maybe I can even put my cookbooks in a better spot, so I can remember I have them and actually use them . . . or at least read them. :)

I really need to get organized.

Book Review Burnout and the Fallacy of Striving

2011-11-05T00:11:00.000-07:00

I'm getting burned out on book reviews lately. I haven't written many in the past year or so and whenever I get the chance, I'm like - eh.

Lately I've been a lot more excited about reading blogs, or even just reading books on my Kindle but for my own enjoyment and not really for review. I had a professor in graduate school who said it was naive to think that people would study literature for the enjoyment of books, and then he would give a little dry laugh. He was a great professor, but I dare to be naive because even after graduating, I can't give up on the idea that books can and should be enjoyable. (and maybe literature professors should make some life changes if they don't think they are.)

But writing book reviews can make enjoying books tough. For one thing, I feel a sort of professional responsibility to do a thorough job, so I have to make sure I really analyze and pay attention to the book. But then half the time, I don't live up to that professional responsibility because there is not time, so I just write a review of the first few chapters and call it good. Sometimes the editor expects a good review from a popular book and it's hard to know when one of those times is coming. Overall, I just don't see the point in reviewing books for me right now.

So maybe I'll start reviewing blogs or just talking about what I've been reading rather than trying to do formal book reviews. I helped launch a "what we're reading" blog on Identity Theory which was meant to just be a reading journal of anything, any era, not the new books being put out by the publisher's PR machines but the books we were genuinely reading at that time. While I haven't written for them for years, and they seem to be letting it die on the vine, I still like the concept. I started this blog after I stopped writing for them so I would have somewhere to continue the idea, and in the midst of writing this blog, I started putting some kind of striving energy toward this thing and ruined it in my mind.

So I guess the answer to my book review burnout might be to get back to that idea of just talking about whatever I am reading instead of reading something for the purpose of talking about it. There's no money or glory in book reviews anyway. Why strive?

Thanks for listening. I feel better.

Self-Publishing Colin on Kindle

2011-09-30T12:46:00.000-07:00

I'm not a huge fan of self-publishing - it's hard to sell books without the marketing and distribution network of a big publisher. Even small presses have a hard time. But Amazon has the opportunity to self-publish for Kindle, and since you don't have to put up any money up front, we thought we would give it a try for a couple of Colin's stories.

Colin Maguire writes literary horror, and even though I don't care for horror in general, I do like spooky stories sometimes and I really like his work (full disclosure: I am married to the man, but that doesn't stop me from critiquing his work if I don't like it). It's scary without being too gory.

He has one story, Swamp Bride, which is written in perfect pitch dialect. I watched him go over that story with a fine-toothed comb to make sure the dialect was consistent. And his other story available on Kindle, Ostrich Night, is a surprisingly sensitive and emotionally complex portrait of what happens if you treat your animals poorly. Check them out if you like horror or dark fantasy. They are only $2.99 each! You can read Kindle stories even if you don't have a Kindle - you can read them on your PC, smartphone, tablet etc.

note: I am a member of Amazon Associates but I didn't use my Associates link for these stories. I think it's against the terms of service to promote your own work using the link, and since Colin is my husband and we live in a community property state, I am not taking chances.

Oxford Girl by Plum Sykes

2011-06-05T11:03:00.000-07:00

Oxford Girl is a mini-memoir by the socialite and author Plum Sykes. It mainly deals with her first year at Oxford, and holds a lot of promise: a shy, "poor as a church mouse" yet still upper crust British kid in the late 80's balances her academic life and social life while managing to not smoke a cigarette until her second year. I'm a sucker for any story of rich girls behaving badly, or even behaving, if they get to wear puffy 80's cocktail dresses to parties in dorm rooms. But with all this raw content to work with, the essay left me a little cold. It does provide a window into a world that I wouldn't have seen into otherwise, but the construction of this piece could have used some work.

This was a piece exclusive to Kindle as a part of its Kindle Singles program, which are pieces that are shorter than full length books and less expensive. Frankly, it feels like Sykes rushed her submission - she brings up a lot of topics that are never fully developed. She writes a compelling passage about how her academic tutor reads her the riot act after the first week, but then never mentions her academic progress again. She tells us she goes to a lot of the parties the high society kids are throwing, but only describes one in depth, then telling us that she was actually uncomfortable at the parties. I can see why she was uncomfortable at this party (I won't spoil it but the decor was rather . . gruesome). But were all parties this way? I need more! She uses a box of memories from Oxford as a framing device, but when she comes back to it at the end, she hadn't used it enough, so you sort of had forgotten its existence.

I have read several Kindle Singles and they have ranged from "one of the best stories I've ever read" to . . "wow I wouldn't have finished this if it were a blog post, why did I pay 99c for it?" This piece falls in the middle. I feel like a shorter piece should have more focus and cover fewer topics. That having been said, this piece was interesting just because her world is so different than mine. I was a high school student in a working class town in Iowa during the time period she writes about being a high society British girl at Oxford. Hearing these stories in this format was sort of like sitting down for a cocktail with someone you meet once and will probably never see again, just having a pleasant night trading tales. Despite the construction flaws, it peaked my interest enough for me to download samples of her two novels, Bergdorf Blondes and The Debutante Divorcee. So in the end, even if it wasn't a totally polished essay, and I feel it's a 3/5 star book, it was still worth my time to read.

Kindle Review, part 4 - Tech - User Experience

2011-06-04T14:42:00.000-07:00

In my last post, I talked about the user experience with the Kindle screen and why I chose it over Barnes and Noble's Nook. In this post, I will discuss a variety of other user experience and technical topics. Then I want to go back to reviewing books for a while! There is one big Kindle topic left, which is content, but I think I will sprinkle that throughout my posts for a while and do a more holistic post about it later.

One decision you need to make when buying the Kindle: 3G or wi-fi? I chose the wi-fi only version because it was $60 cheaper at the time, and I'm rarely away from wi-fi. I live in a major city with wi-fi everywhere, and I have wi-fi at home and work. The only time I don't have wi-fi is during my 20 minute bus commute each day. If you only use your Kindle for reading books, like I do, the only time you need a wireless connection is when you are downloading new books, which isn't very often. You might need 3G if you don't have a computer or wi-fi (which is easy to set up at home with the purchase of an inexpensive wireless router), or if you travel a lot or live in a place where there is not ready access to wi-fi.

The only other benefit to 3G over wi-fi is that wi-fi drains the battery a little more (I've heard). But the battery life on the Kindle is so long that I never have trouble with the battery draining while I am reading. The Kindle website says the battery can last up to two months if you turn off your wi-fi. I haven't tested that, since I am too lazy to turn off my wi-fi, but I just find if I plug it in for an hour here and there, the battery life is no problem. The Kindle is not really doing anything that would drain a battery too much.

OK, so there is a commercial out there with a snotty girl saying she didn't want the Kindle because you can't turn the pages over, and the guy says this is not true. It's true that there are no pages, but I like Kindle's bookmark system a lot. It's an easy-to-get-to menu option and the bookmark is always saved, unlike paper bookmarks which can fall out! As you read through the book, all your previous bookmarks are saved as well.

Another snotty comment heard about the Kindle, which I actually heard from Joyce Carol Oates at a reading she gave, was that you can't mark passages (cue old people cheering). Actually, sorry Joyce, but you can! There is even a feature you can turn on or off where you can see which passages others have highlighted. I don't care to know that when I am reading for pleasure, so I turned it off. But it might be interesting to others; like the feature where you can review the book afterwards from your Kindle (albeit with the dumb little squirrel-sized QWERTY keyboard), it kind of brings a social network element to reading which might be fun. And if you fall asleep reading your Kindle, even though it doesn't technically "bookmark" your page, chances are your place is still there, because the screen saver comes on after a short time and it can't fall "closed" like a paper book.

This brings me to a topic that is near and dear to many: reading in bed. So many people have said "Well, Kindles are interesting, but I like to read in bed with my books propped up on my chest/pillow etc." I actually find it easier to read in bed with a Kindle now. It's very lightweight and portable, and the page turning is so easy - you just click a button rather than moving your hand or arm to turn a page. This means you can get comfortable and don't really have to take the book's physical weight or size into account. I have been an avid reader for going on 35 years now, much of that done while lying down, and I was kind of floored by how fast I converted to Kindle reading, especially in bed. It's just so much more comfortable.

**note: I am a member of Amazon Associates, and if enough of you click links to Amazon that I add to my posts, I will receive a tiny incentive. Computers are smart; they know we are talking about Kindle at the moment, so there might even be a Kindle for sale in the ad box on my page right now (the content of which I do not control). However, Amazon did not send me my Kindle to review and I am not receiving any compensation from them (or anyone else) directly for writing this series of posts, which reflect my true experience as an Amazon customer and Kindle reader.

Although I would sell it to them if they wanted it . . .

New Template - Feedback please!

2011-06-04T13:45:00.001-07:00

I changed the template of this blog. Do you like it?

Business cards!

2011-06-04T13:26:00.001-07:00

No one really reads this blog, so I need to promote it more. So I got some business cards!

Kindle Review, Part 3, Tech User Experience - Screens

2011-05-30T15:35:00.000-07:00

There are quite a few e-readers on the market, but the only two I took seriously as options (because of content availability) were the Kindle and the Nook (Barnes and Noble's e-reader). In this and my next post, I'll explore the tech from a user perspective* and explain why I prefer the Kindle. I have the 6" Kindle, which as of this writing they were calling "Latest Generation Kindle." This post addresses the screen, and in the interest of space, I'm going to write one future post to address other tech/user related Kindle issues.

I have to admit, before even starting this process, I preferred Amazon as a content vendor over Barnes and Noble (and I am not just saying that because I participate in the Amazon affiliates program!). I will explore that in another post. So all user experience being equal, I might have still gone with the Kindle, but I actually did prefer the Kindle device available at the time.

In the fall of 2010, there were a couple of Nook options.The Nook Color was available for about $250. They also had a black and white e-ink Nook, which had a tiny color screen underneath which was used for menus, etc. that they call the "Color Navigation Panel." That one is still for sale under the name "Nook 1st Edition." I use a computer all day at work and spend a lot of time online at home, so for my e-reader, I wanted little to no glare. I found the Color Navigation Panel screen to be distracting when trying out the Nook in the BN store for just a few minutes, so I can't imagine what it would be like to read for hours at home.

Can you turn off the Color Navigation Panel when you are reading? Can the Nook Color screen approximate e-ink if I want it to? I don't know, because the website doesn't say, and in the healthy chunk of time I spent going around trying out the different Nooks in my local BN store, zero employees approached or greeted me; I suppose they were all smoking pot by the dumpsters, reading fantasy paperbacks, or whatever BN employees do instead of helping customers.

The Kindle screen is black and white e-ink, which is far better than backlit color screens for long periods of reading. This means you can read outside in bright light. It also means that you can't read in the dark. However, you can't read books in the dark either! Amazon sells quite a few book lights, and while I can't recommend one because I haven't tried any, the Verso Clip-On Reading Light for Kindle is currently the highest rated one. Amazon also sells lighted covers if reading in the dark is important to you. I probably will buy the Verso light at some point, but for now on those rare occasions when I want to read in the dark, I just use the Android app.

The menus and browser are also rendered in e-ink, which is not great, but for shopping the Kindle Store it is fine, and I don't browse the web otherwise with it (I have a phone and a netbook for that). I do wish it had a touch screen. There is an e-ink Nook on the market now that has a touch screen and doesn't have the Color Navigation Panel. If that one had been out at the time, it might have swayed my opinion, but it wasn't. I am rooting for Amazon in this fight, and there have been rumors of a new Kindle coming soon. I hope it has touch screen, and I hope they do away with the one feature that really sucks about the Kindle: its dumb little keyboard.

The Kindle has a teeny, tiny Qwerty keyboard. Who is going to type on this keyboard? Squirrels? I don't know, but that is the one big thing I do not like about the Kindle. However, you rarely need to type unless you are shopping in the Kindle store, and it is easy enough for me to just go online and shop for books. They download to the Kindle immediately if you set up your account that way. Since the other option at the time was the Nook with the weird little glare-y color screen at the bottom, I preferred the dumb keyboard. At least it doesn't distract you and make your eyes hurt.

The last screen issue to really think about is whether you want color or not. There is a color Nook, but at $250, that is approaching tablet price. I really didn't want to spend a lot more than $100 on a single purpose device - the one I got was $139, but there is now a Kindle with Offers for $114. You decide if an ad-free reading experience is worth $25 to you. If you read my previous posts, you might remember that I ended up getting the Kindle as a Christmas gift, but even so - $250 for a Nook Color doesn't fit in our Christmas budget either. I don't read a lot of color books; the ones I do read are cookbooks and art books. I'm not sure any e-reader could do those books justice, because the size is also a factor. And there is no way I am taking my Kindle into the bomb-tastic mess that my kitchen becomes when I am cooking. E-readers are better for efficient reading where you want to get lost in the story, not as much for books where the beauty or design of the book is part of the enjoyment, like with an art book or a cookbook. So I decided to continue to buy those on paper and thus didn't need to consider their use on my e-reader.

Another thought about e-readers with color screens: I don't usually buy single purpose devices, and my tech purchases are minimal and very thought out because I like to keep things low maintenance and inexpensive around here. Having said that, I ultimately do plan to buy a tablet, which I will use for reading books and for a lot of my online activities, so I really thought about skipping the e-reader device altogether and saving for the tablet. But even though price was a factor in choosing between color and e-ink, the bottom line is, if I wanted a color e-reader or a tablet right away, I would have found the money somehow. I did try the Kindle app on my PC (which is a Samsung NB30 netbook, and comfortable enough to read on) and I still like the e-ink screen for long bouts of reading. So I think even once I do purchase a tablet, I will keep reading non-color books primarily on my Kindle.

In my next post, I will discuss other tech/user issues like

3G or Wifi?
Bookmarks
Reading in bed
Battery life
Portability
Turning pages

*if you are a techie and want to read more about the specs and stuff behind the Kindle, this is not the post for you, but you know which tech blogs you like, right?

**note: I am a member of Amazon Associates, and if enough of you click links to Amazon that I add to my posts, I will receive a tiny incentive. Computers are smart; they know we are talking about Kindle at the moment, so there might even be a Kindle for sale in the ad box on my page right now (the content of which I do not control). However, Amazon did not send me my Kindle to review and I am not receiving any compensation from them (or anyone else) directly for writing this series of posts, which reflect my true experience as an Amazon customer and Kindle reader.

Although I would sell it to them if they wanted it . . .

Kindle Review, part 2 - First Impressions

2011-03-06T13:54:00.000-08:00

© 2011 Angie Kritenbrink

Just putting the Kindle on my wishlist for Christmas was mind-stretching enough. I didn't think anyone would actually get it for me - it was a little over what we spend on gifts in my family. I figured I would wait until after Christmas and buy it for myself. But my mom and sisters went together, and before Christmas day even arrived, I had a Kindle in my hot little hands! (To my mother's chagrin, I usually open my presents as soon as they arrive, not waiting for Santa to visit before opening them.) In fact it shipped so fast, no one even had time to warn me an Amazon surprise was coming, and I didn't actually know it was a Christmas gift . . . yeah, that is my excuse.

I had chosen the latest generation wifi-only Kindle, which (as of this writing) is priced at $139. I will get into the tech side of my decision in another post. When getting a new Kindle, you also need to buy some books - keep that in mind if you are giving as a gift or budgeting to buy one for yourself. My mom kindly gave me an Amazon gift card along with it. The Kindle Store does have a lot of free books in it, but the selection is somewhat limited to either classic literature or promotional things that mostly didn't look great. With a few exceptions, the promotional books mostly seemed to be an odd mix of Christian novels and erotic fiction. I have over the past few months found a few good short stories here and there, and of course if you do want classic literature, erotic fiction or Christian novels, the free section of the Kindle Store is probably a great place for you.

In the meantime, I had also gotten a new Android phone and downloaded the Kindle App for Android. So now I had Kindle on my PC and my phone, and was ready to start reading on my actual device. I can't say I have used the PC app (which is installed on my netbook) since getting my Kindle device. I'll get more into this in my upcoming tech post, but in short, I prefer the Kindle itself to reading on the apps, although it's pretty sweet to be able to pick up on my phone when necessary.

And my Kindle reading begins thusly. My first Kindle book purchase to read on the actual Kindle device was Jaron Lanier's You Are Not a Gadget. Clever of me, yes? It's a good book, but I'm reading it in small doses, and I still haven't finished it. Good thing the Kindle keeps track of where I was - you can add bookmarks, which I do just to be safe, but it actually just kind of holds your page forever, and syncs to your other devices as well. I've been picking this book up here and there on both the Kindle and my phone.

The also bought a few novels for my Kindle device. The first one that I bought, devoured, read religiously until finishing, etc. was Kathryn Stockett's The Help. I highly recommend this, and I might review it in another post. Suffice it to say, if I wasn't totally converted to e-reading before, reading The Help on my Kindle converted me. You know those books that you just can't put down? The book you want to take everywhere with you? You want to read it while you are commuting on the bus, making dinner, in bed, in the bathroom, on your lunch break, in your sleep, as soon as you get up in the morning? The Help was one of those books for me.

Up until this point, I was one of those "but I like the feel of a book in my hands" people. But you know what; books are heavy. Starting with my commute: in my messenger bag, along with my coffee thermos, lunch, makeup bag with 11 lipsticks (all highly necessary) in it, wallet, phone, flashlight, keys, and all the other crap I accumulate, the couple of pounds of a book really makes a difference. The Kindle is so light and thin, it slides right in. And then the physical act of reading it on the bus is so much easier. Reading a Kindle just requires you to hold it in place and click a button to turn pages. There is a button on either side so that you can turn pages with your right or left hand, with a smaller one above to go backwards. There are smooth little indentations on the back for your fingers to hold on to. Reading a paper book or magazine on the bus can be a little challenging, depending on the size of the book and how quickly you need to turn pages, how big your seatmate is and what that person is doing, and the Kindle helps this a lot as you can stay still and read.

This lightness and ease of page-turning translates to any time you are reading while laying down, too. I've always loved to curl up in bed with a book, but until I did it with the Kindle I didn't realize how much I was kind of in denial about the discomfort of a big uncomfortable book. And honestly, as you age and everything gets a little stiffer, your hands can start to ache a little from holding up a big book while laying down and turning pages. Ergonomically it feels kind of crampy to have to grip a heavy book for a long time, but the Kindle allows you to stretch your fingers in a more natural position while holding it. There is always the problem of where to rest the book and how to not damage it, crease it, or stain it. I hate to say it, but I realized pretty quickly that it wasn't the feel of the book in my hands - it's the stories in books that I love, and the feel of the book was just a collateral thing rather than part of the experience that was bringing me enjoyment.

Another pleasant Kindle surprise was the flow. I read very quickly, and it's nothing to just go click, click, click, turning pages. In fact, when I read on the Android app on my tiny phone screen, with my reading pace, I am basically turning pages all the time. Kindle books had no page numbers when I got my Kindle in December 2010, although some do now after a recent upgrade. I can see where you would want page numbers for book clubs and classes where other people are using paper books, but for casual reading I actually really like the Kindle's system of having locations (which are more specific than pages) and then showing you a percentage of how much you have read. It means more to me that I am 82% of the way through the book than being on page 176 out of 214 pages. That's some math on the fly I don't need to do when reading a book I am really enjoying.

It's a little scary to say this, but after just a few weeks I was pretty much converted to reading on a Kindle, and when I had to read a few paper books for reviews, I missed my Kindle device. In future posts in this series, I will talk more in depth about my experience with the different types of content I've read on the Kindle, along with the more technical side of things. [to be continued]

**note: I am a member of Amazon Associates, and if enough of you click links to amazon.com that I add to my posts, I will receive a tiny incentive. Computers are smart; they know we are talking about Kindle at the moment, so there might even be a Kindle for sale in the ad box on my page right now (the content of which I do not control). However, Amazon did not send me my Kindle to review and I am not receiving any compensation from them (or anyone else) directly for writing this series of posts, which reflect my true experience as an Amazon customer and Kindle reader.

Although I would sell it to them if they wanted it. . .

Kindle Review - Part 1: In which this reader suffers much anxiety about switching to ebooks.

2011-02-26T14:05:00.000-08:00

© 2011 Angie Kritenbrink

For a long time, I wasn't sure if I wanted an ebook reader - being a "book person," I've spent the last 20 years reading, buying, and selling books, and my collection of books has grown and evolved along with me. They live in my apartment, whisper secrets to me, and make moving a chore that no friend is foolish enough to help me with twice.

There is the fiction section filled with beloved novels shelved next to things I picked up at used book sales and am looking forward to reading. I have a shelf of women's studies books from the time I was in graduate school and really wished there was a women's studies program for me to minor in (along with my American Literature emphasis). I have books on history, poetry, art, writing, plays, anthologies -- and when I got married six years ago and moved to Seattle, my husband's books and mine started to sort of mingle together and become one collection. They live in our living room and overflow to other rooms in the house - cookbooks in the kitchen, my husband Colin's current reading and treasured favorites in a small bookcase next to his side of the bed.

I even went 21st century with my collection, creating an inventory on Library Thing, one of the first sites to allow you to do this. I manage it with care, adding and subtracting in real time. I religiously keep "new books" on a different shelf until they are cataloged there. I'm on the Internet multiple hours a day, and I've been involved with social networking since the beginning. I even do IT at work now. I did very thorough research to decide which ebook reader was the best for me, settling on Amazon's Kindle (for reasons I will explain in another post). So I am not a Luddite, but the printed book has been so much a part of my life and my soul for so many years that I just wasn't sure if I wanted to delve into ebooks at all or buy a Kindle.

It always takes me time to make a decision that will have this much impact. As I thought about it over several weeks, I sat in my living room and stared at my book collection. What would happen to it? Would it be stunted, stopping growth in 2010? Friends and family who visit often wander over and start browsing my shelves. Would they forever reflect me at age 37? Will I continue to sell or donate books from time to time, never adding new ones? I imagined an apocalypse of empty shelves, dusty, littered with the last few dogeared copies of my Alice Munro collection and a couple of old New Yorker issues. (oh, the magazines and newspapers which have already bit the dust in favor of aggregators and RSS feeds. But I still get the New Yorker every week. It will be the last thing I read on paper.)

I talked to tech people about it, who suffered my hesitation with thinly veiled patience (or not, being tech people). I talked to book people about it, who were staunchly in the corner of the printed page. It was silly of me, really, to be so histrionic. Maybe there were things I could read on ebooks and others I would still buy good old-fashioned bound books of. I should just try it with a book I didn't care SO much about, I told myself. I had been reading the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo Series, which is addictive, and not so important to me to "collect," so I downloaded the free Kindle PC app and bought the Kindle edition of the third book, The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest which was only available in Kindle or hardback at the time. It's kind of apropos that I read that book first, since it has a tech focus. Even on my netbook, it was comfortable and a good reading experience. So I went ahead and put a Kindle on my wishlist for Christmas. [to be continued]

**note: I am a member of Amazon Associates, and if enough of you click links to Amazon that I add to my posts, I will receive a tiny incentive. Computers are smart; they know we are talking about Kindle at the moment, so there might even be a Kindle for sale in the ad box on my page right now (the content of which I do not control). However, Amazon did not send me my Kindle to review and I am not receiving any compensation from them (or anyone else) directly for writing this series of posts, which reflect my true experience as an Amazon customer and Kindle reader.

Although I would sell it to them if they wanted it . . .

Back to Small Pressures

2011-02-26T12:13:00.001-08:00

I've been experimenting with different blog topics and formats over the last couple of years, but I am going to go back to this one and writing about books and culture again. Please join me!

Mennonite in a Little Black Dress

2009-11-01T16:04:00.000-08:00

Rhoda Janzen
Henry Holt and Company
Oct. 2009 release date

If any of the following are true about you:

You were raised in a prominent Mennonite family
You are now an English professor
You have experienced both a surgical error and a debilitating car accident in the past few years
Your husband recently left you for a guy named Bob that he met on a gay dating website

you have probably considered writing a memoir. If ALL of the above are true, your name is Rhoda Janzen, and your memoir Mennonite in a Little Black Dress is a can't miss.

In general, I'm vaguely annoyed by the memoir genre, specifically the recent (the past decade or so) trend of unknown, often struggling writers, dragging us through the mud of their family histories or personal struggles with adulthood's many temptations. I'm sent a lot of memoirs to review that can't hold me past chapter 3.

But Janzen's book is different. The title hints at the emotional and cognitive dissonance that comes from being raised in a very traditional religious community and then growing as an adult into an educated urbanite who leaves the religion of her childhood behind. And some pretty screwed up things happen in her marriage, even before (as she calls him) "Bob the Guy" shows up. But Rhoda Janzen is not screwed up, at least no more than anyone else I know, and her parents are delightful, if eccentric, companions as she stays with them post-divorce while she completes an academic project and tries to sell her too-expensive-without-two-incomes lakefront house.

Many memoirs smell of desperation, but Mennonite in a Little Black Dress is insistently fresh: quick and light when telling funny family stories, of which there are many; clear and frank when discussing complex situations and disappointments. Writing a memoir was a friend's idea after Janzen sent humorous emails about her stay with her parents; she's trained and published as a poet and this is her first non-fiction book. I hope if there are more, they are as funny and as heartfelt as this one.

November ELLE Reader's Prize

2009-10-22T20:41:00.000-07:00

I participated in the ELLE Reader's Prize again this month, and when the magazine came out, they didn't put anyone's blurbs in! But they did post parts of my blurbs, along with a few others, on their website. This was a fun month, because I would have never read the book I ended up picking as #1 had I read a summary of it before I dug in. I had these over the summer, and I dragged Her Fearful Symmetry around Oregon with me and spent many hours on the beach with it. It was the perfect vacation read: escapist, kind of ridiculous, but emotionally intense and satisfying.

Here are the full blurbs I turned in, along with my rankings, for your enjoyment:

1.) Her Fearful Symmetry by Audrey Niffenegger

I didn't actually know when starting this novel that it was going to be a ghost story -- not my favorite. But by the time a ghost appears, I was so hooked by the characters and their particular dilemmas, and the situation that the ghost is in is so charming, that it barely bothered me. The central characters in Her Fearful Symmetry are two sets of twins, the older set the mother and aunt to the younger set. It's rare for a genre piece to be this literary, with depth of characterization, complex storylines, and only slightly confusing resolutions, that I can forgive the spectral aspects of it and start looking forward to the inevitable film adaptation. I'm especially excited for the eye-popping airport scene, just a few seconds of two waifs in innocent/edgy outfits and luggage that matches their personalities to a T. Mary Kate and Ashley, get ready for your closeups.

2.) A Change in Altitude by Anita Shreve
An enjoyable enough tale about young marriage and adventure in 1970's Kenya. Margaret and Patrick are an American couple working and living overseas because of Patrick's work in medical research. They are caught up in a tragedy that has significant personal implications for the couple. Growing bored with dilletantism, Margaret restarts her career as a photographer and grows deeply involved in the people and culture of Kenya. If anything, the sections of the novel which deal with Margaret's career are much more intense, dynamic and satisfying than the arc of the story the author seems to want you to follow, which is the events around the tragedy and Margaret's recovery from it.

3.) Half Broke Horses by Jeannette Walls
[note: the galley I received was missing many pages, so this review is based more on my impression of the style]

Half Broke Horses is a "true-life novel" based on the life of the author's grandmother. Apparently she has had some success in the past writing about her mother's life, but this book is not successful to me. The myopic narration is too much like a family story -- an unreliable narrator giving short snapshots of events in her life, replacing reflection with platitudes and introspection with, well, more platitudes. I suppose it would be fun to read if I hadn't already read many dozens of frontier novels as a kid growing up in the Midwest, and those who know this author or the area might find it interesting -- maybe it's even an accurate historical record of the time. But to call something a novel implies you've added a story arc or a set of themes that your work illustrates rather than describes.

Julie and Julia

2009-08-15T11:07:00.000-07:00

I don't usually review films, but I feel like many of the reviews of the charming Julie and Julia have been so off base that I had to add to the conversation. Many reviews have wished for more of the Julia character and less of the Julie character, or at least said that the Julia character was more interesting to watch. And maybe there should be a Julia Child biopic starring Meryl Streep, but that's not what this movie is about. Here's why.

First, the fantastic book Julie and Julia by Julie Powell, based on her blog The Julie/Julia Project, was the basis for the movie, and while Powell does quote (and imagine) Child in the book for atmosphere, the original book was much more about Julie than Julia. Yeah, maybe this sounds like a pointless whine about the movie being adapted differently than the book . . . and I don't mind that the Julia Child part was expanded and the Julie Powell character was whitewashed a little, although it would have been interesting to see a less mainstream writer/director make this film (Amy Heckerling? Pedro Almodovar? Stanley Tucci?). It's a Nora Ephron film. What do you expect? I'm surprised Meg Ryan didn't pop up somewhere. But the film as it exists was not adapted so far off of the book to focus as much on Julia as the critics may have you thinking.

For critics to ignore the fact that the story is Julie Powell's story is a little ridiculous. Even if you hadn't read the book, or Julia Child's books, even if you have been asleep for the past 50 years, or even if you, like me, were always intensely irritated by Julia Child and switch off the TV any time she appears, we know what happened to Julia Child before we hear the Julie/Julia story, whether through the blog, the book, or the film. She became a chef in her late 30's after being a government worker during WWII. She wrote a famous French cookbook. Even Emeril admires her. Whatever! It's historical background, cultural filler, not a dynamic plotline.

Meanwhile, Julie Powell is a relatable character to me and many in my generation (I turned 30 the same year Julie Powell did). She's college educated and underemployed (again as a government worker, eek), vaguely artistic but having a hard time finding a passion, married, childless, and living an urban lifestyle that is more grubby than glamorous but still manages to be comfortable enough. Most importantly, she's hit a critical moment when the ennui of her 20's is melting into a low but pulsing undercurrent of purposelessness as she turns 30.

The plot is just more Julie's. There are no surprises in Julia Child's scenes, but one of the great joys of the story is following Julie through the mania of being overwhelmed with recipes, deadlines, and expectations to the marital troubles that ensue, all the way to when she starts to be recognized and finally gets a freaking book deal. It's an emotional nailbiter with a real life fairy tale ending, brought on not by magic but by Julie Powell cooking and writing her brains out. You or I could do it. I'm even a government worker with a blog! When Amy Adams in the film says, teary-eyed, that she was drowning and Julia saved her, I felt it, and her performance overall was wonderful as usual. Amy Adams would not be a perfect casting choice for the real Julie Powell (think Nia Vardalos with a dash of Sarah Silverman), but for the Julie Powell character as she appears in the movie (less profane, a little more frail and composed) she was a wonderful choice.

Meryl Streep, on the other hand, was a poor casting choice for Julia Child, and I don't care if you think I'll burn in hell for saying so. Meryl Streep, of course, always shines, and it's not her fault I don't like her presence in this movie; she did a wonderful job impersonating Julia Child. I even liked the Julia Child in the film sometimes, much better than I did the TV one in real life, so that's something. Perhaps the addition of the sublime Stanley Tucci as Mr. Child and the focus on the relationship helped with that (except for during one awful scene where, about to make love to Julia after she's fixed an amazing lunch, he looks like he is wrestling a wax dummy of her onto the bed).

But is there some rule in Hollywood that if we revere someone as a cultural icon, she can only be played by someone with more Oscar nominations than God? The film covers the Childs' time in Paris, when Julia was in her late 30's to early 40's , and the way the story is framed, both Julie and Julia are going through vulnerable, transformative periods as they see the dark tunnel of middle age approaching with no specific plan in mind. Meryl Streep is 60 years old! Could they have found an actress of the correct generation to play the part?

I lay awake last night thinking of options. Does Maggie Gyllenhall have the comedic chops? Jenna Elfman has the goofy demeanor, but can she act? Laura Linney could have done it; Laura Linney can act anything beautifully and still complement the other actors in the work (see: everything Laura Linney has done from the genius John Adams to the cinematic cesspool Love Actually). Laura Linney has been nominated for several Oscars, even! Laura Linney, can you hear me? You must find out what Meryl is up to and stop her next time before she steals another movie from another wonderful actress by impersonating a major figure in a minor role.

Because in the end, here's the problem: Reviewers are expecting a Julia Child biopic and disappointed with the Julie Powell "interruptions" because the movie has been marketed as a Julie Child biopic with interjections from the parallel life story of an admirer named Julie Powell. Julia Child is more famous than Julie Powell (and every food writer); Meryl Streep is more famous than Amy Adams (and every actress). Meryl's on the front page of the website alone. Amy Adams does not appear on the site until you click into it, and even then in a collage of photos including Meryl and both husbands. Meryl starts and ends the trailer, which includes scenes of Amy Adams watching Meryl on TV and even goes so far to declare the movie is "The story of a legend who gave one woman the recipe to change her life."

But that's not what the movie is about. The movie is about the woman who changed her life, not the woman who hung out for several scenes impersonating a legend waiting to become a legend. A Julia Child biopic starring Meryl Streep (or even Laura Linney!) as Julia Child, right on up to the age of 91 when she died, would be wonderful. But in this otherwise wonderful film -- Julie's story -- casting Meryl Streep to play the minor role of Julia Child was a distraction and a disservice to the story, to Amy Adams, and to the imperfect yet inspiring Julie Powell.

ELLE's Readers' Prize for August

2009-08-11T22:20:00.000-07:00

Here's something kind of fun: I had a blurb in the ELLE's Lettres section of ELLE magazine in August. I'm on their Reader's Prize panel, which is not a paid book review gig, but is fun in the sense that you get to read a lot of new books and vote on which one you like best, and suffer a little delicious anticipation to see whether your blurb made the magazine.

Since I wrote three blurbs and only one made the pages of ELLE, here are all three for your enjoyment:

My rankings for the August Reader’s Prize (this was a hard one – they were all really good and it was hard to compare the Kogan book with the other two):

1.) What I Thought I Knew

2.) Hell is Other Parents

3.) This Lovely Life

This Lovely Life, whatever complaints I have about it, beats whole months worth of other books I’ve been sent in the past, though.

Here are my notes:

What I Thought I Knew

So, you're 44, you've been told you should never have children, but that's OK because you can't, have been taking hormones half your adult life, and you don't find out until 6 months in that you're pregnant. What do you do? If you're Alice Eve Cohen, a writer of one-woman shows with a distinctive, manic, sometimes hilarious voice, you write your story, which you say you'll never perform, even though you've structured it exactly like a play. What I Thought I Knew is a nail-biter, a breathless read, a terror and a joy. Brutally, engagingly honest about the fears and the options that go through a woman's mind in this situation, Cohen successfully puts herself back into the frame of mind she was in during her pregnancy, and it's as if she herself is not sure how it will end before it does. As a reader, I was right there with her, loving her and hating her along the way until I came to the shimmering end.

Hell Is Other Parents: And Other Tales of Maternal Combustion by Deborah Copaken Kogan

If all the other mothers in her Manhattan milieu are Alpha moms, Deborah Copaken Kogan is a Beta mom. Mom 2.0. Mom on the bleeding edge, making up the rules as she goes along, and making me jealous once again since reading her brilliant novel last year that we're not best friends. If there's a common thread amongst this month's books, it's brutal honesty about the highs and lows of motherhood, and while this is by far the lightest of the three, it's got its earthy moments, and I was glad to see tales of Kogan's personal history (work hurdles, former lovers) woven in with her parenting stories. An alpha mom might write a book for the self-help section, but Kogan's book shows all the other smart, strong and still sane moms out there that they have a voice, too.

This Lovely Life

In This Lovely Life, twin super-preemies are born at 24 weeks; one dies, one is disabled. The book's cover promises an ultimately uplifting story, but I must have missed something. The events of the book are harrowing, if gripping, and the manner in which it's written creates a jarring effect. The narrative focuses mainly on the surviving child's first couple of years of life, but skips forward to tell you the ultimate outcome of whichever medical situation he's in long before you hear the whole story taking place in the "present" time. I appreciate the intensity and the honesty of the book, but it's difficult to stay interested in complex medical descriptions or try to understand the clues to what is about to happen when you already know the outcome. The moments of reflection and hope feel forced, as if someone said she needed to add them in, when her voice is so strong, and so understandably dark, that the reader would have understood.

Chicken with Plums by Marjane Satrapi

2009-06-30T20:28:00.000-07:00

I love everything Marjane Satrapi does, so it's no surprise I loved this book. I read this in the context of the 2009 Iranian presidential election, and while this book is not political, it helped give me an insight to a small corner of Iranian culture.

The main character of this graphic novel is a man who decides to die, and within the first few pages, you know that he does. The book outlines his journey toward death, and the reader is the only one who knows it's really going to happen, lending to a darkly bittersweet tone.

I admire Satrapi's emotional honesty and clear-headed approach to tragedy. This man is related to her, although he died before she was born, the story is told with love that was passed down through generations. This slim volume manages to be a luminous rumination on marriage, art, and family.

Local Breads and local breads

2009-06-10T23:15:00.000-07:00

I started a sourdough starter about a month ago, and so far I have used it to make a few loaves of bread with a variety of success rates, as well as some pizzas. I wanted to know more about sourdough, and the online resources are super helpful but somewhat limited in the way websites can be. And sometimes there's nothing better than curling up with a good cookbook (certainly not baking the actual bread!).

So I picked up a copy of Local Breads by Daniel Leader. It's a beautiful book with long, detailed chapters about his visits to a variety of European bakeries and what he learned from each one. Recipes are mixed throughout the book. I actually tried one of the recipes, but I bastardized it so much that I won't even mention its name here. In fact, I could pull a sort of reverse Julie and Julia and blog for a year about how badly I can screw up great bakers' recipes by either not having the ingredients and going ahead anyway, being too impatient to wait the full proofing time, or being in denial about the fact that my dough is Just Not Rising. But I doubt I'll have the energy after all this feeding my starter, planning recipes for days ahead of time, and other shenanigans that go into bread baking. (can you tell the honeymoon is over?)

A striking note from Leader is the idea that sourdough is invariably local. Even if you buy a starter and ship it across country or around the world, after feeding it and refreshing it and all that, it will ultimately be taken over by the local yeasts. I think it's kind of freaky how Trader Joe's tries to sell me bread from California; I try to buy local bread whenever possible, and will again after this bread-baking stage of mine reaches its inevitable crescendo of fiascosity. But now I know when I am buying from Macrina or Essential Baking or some other wonderful Seattle bakery, I am really buying something you truly couldn't get anywhere else, and that's rare and special to me.

A Guide to Visitors

2009-05-27T23:08:00.001-07:00

In March, I told a story in a show called A Guide to Visitors, which is a small storytelling show in a very small theatre in a small bar in Belltown, Seattle, WA, USA. I'm new to storytelling, although I have done poetry open mics in the past. It's great, as my work gets more and more professional and political, to have this outlet where I can just get on stage and express myself, me, and tell these stories about the things that happened to me in the Omaha days. At least that's what I've done so far.

Tomorrow night the theme of the show is "Crash," and I am telling a story this time about my ex-boyfriend and me, when we drove to Canada to cash in some Canadian change. It was kind of a fiasco in many ways, kind of like a lot of my life then, kind of like that relationship. But this story is just a funny story, and I'm looking forward to telling it tomorrow night.

Sourdough Starter

2009-05-24T21:11:00.000-07:00

Well, it's official; I've completely lost my mind.

I was paging through Edible Seattle the other weekend and saw a story about and recipe for sourdough starter. I've never been much of a baker, especially bread, because I figure there are professionals out there who know what they are doing more than I do, and I can buy their beautiful work without having to do much of it myself. Sure, it's a little more expensive, but when grocery shopping for two people, sometimes you can afford the good stuff if it's a priority.

However, I've been feeling more like a homebody these days, I'm more and more interested in learning the older ways of doing things, and this article about sourdough was really interesting. I read some more about sourdough on some websites, like Sourdough Home and Northwest Sourdough, and I quickly got caught up in the romanticism of it. Apparently people used to guard their starters close to their hearts, literally, as starter has to be kept warm and people carried it on their trails out west and on gold rushes, etc. There are starters that supposedly go back generations and centuries.

So what's a starter? It's a soupy mix (or sometimes, in Europe, a very dry mix) of flour and water that's left to ferment until the yeasts inside come to life. You feed it every day. It sits on your counter, or if you are not going to use it for a while, your fridge. You mix it into doughs and it functions as the leavening in the bread (instead of the dry packaged yeast you see in the store). I vaguely remember my mom having been given a starter when we were kids one time, but I don't remember us baking with it or how it all played out.

After reading the article, I started my own little chemistry experiment on my kitchen counter. To the right are pictures of my starter after about a week. I started it on May 16, and for the first few days you can't use it, so you have to throw some away and feed the rest. The top picture shows it from a top view, and you can see the bubbly action.

The first thing I made was a loaf of bread. I used the recipe on Northwest Sourdough, only I made a third of the recipe because I didn't really know what I was doing and I didn't want to end up with a ginormous pile of dough. I read the recipe and thought I had it memorized, which of course I didn't, so I made a bunch of mistakes, not the least of which was drinking a couple of glasses of wine in the evening right before the last punch-down and forgetting to put the dough in some kind of floured or lined container in the fridge for the overnight proofing stage. So of course, the dough was very sticky to the bowl in the morning. Then I turned it out, and I had to be somewhere, so I baked it before it really had lost the chill from the fridge, and it ended up with a sort of chewy center where it wasn't fully baked. But, overall, not too shabby for the first time. It did rise and there were some bubbles in it, so I know the starter is working.

The other recipe I have tried so far is the Sourdough Home pizza crust recipe. Yesterday I made the pizza pictured here. I liked that this recipe suggested par-baking the crust before topping it, because one of the biggest issues I always have with pizza is trying to slide it onto the pizza stone, so only having to slide the raw crust on was great -- it did flop a little and a corner of it got stuck on the peel, but it was just the crust, so we didn't have toppings flying all over the oven per usual. After five minutes you take it out and top it, then slide it back in, and by then it's baked enough to have some structure. This one had sausage, orange and yellow bell peppers, and mozzarella cheese. yummmmy. There were leftovers of all the toppings (we prepped too much to fit onto one pizza) so I made another one for lunch today.

This whole sourdough adventure has me thinking. I've always considered good bread one of the markers of a civilized society, and I can't stand "nutrition" freaks who claim you can only eat whole grains all the time. Granted, one should not eat processed food like Cheetos on a regular basis, but a good loaf of handmade bread is one of life's greatest pleasures.

For Colin and me, the past five years have been so crazy and unsettled. We are coming up on our fifth anniversary next month, and in our time as a married couple, we have had multiple jobs, apartments that felt temporary in multiple cities, periods of unemployment and uncertainty, friendships in fits and starts and many that have fizzled out. There were even times when I, anxious about money or jobs or whatever, had dreams at night that we had to haul all of our stuff and our kitties back to live at my parents' house in Iowa.

But now we have an apartment we love, stable jobs that we like and that can pay the bills, and we are starting to get rooted and grounded in Seattle and in our marriage in a way we haven't before. Life isn't perfect, but it's starting to feel like a life that's held together by more than hope, credit cards and magical thinking. So what better time to start a starter, which hopefully will live on my countertop for years to come? What better time to learn to do something civilized? Maybe baking my own bread is not so crazy after all.

A Leap by Anna Enquist

2009-04-19T19:54:00.000-07:00

Toby Press, 2009

A breathtaking collection of monologues, it's difficult to put down once you start A Leap. Starting it on my morning commute had me wishing I had called in sick to finish it.

The monologues start 100 years ago with the wife of a famous artist reflecting on the life she has chosen and what the other choices might have been. When faced with another choice, she does something surprising. They end with a contemporary woman. Between are the voices of several men and women throughout the 20th century, experiencing both public and private horrors: love, loss, WWII. Each monologue has a distinct point of view and voice, different from the last, even though two have similar settings and subject matter.

Anna Enquist is apparently a well-loved Dutch writer, and interestingly, she is also a psychoanalyst. This must be why the stories are so vivid and the inner lives of the characters are really well-developed. I'm kind of jaded about new books, having read a lot of crap, so it's really exciting to me to have been sent this book and to discover this author.

The Pale Surface of Things

2008-09-14T21:14:00.000-07:00

The Pale Surface of Things by Janey Bennett
Hopeace Press, 2007

Many times, when reading small press and self-published books, the reasons the book was published by a small press are obvious. It could be an obscure topic, an eccentric writing style, a local or regional audience, or even though I hate to say it and these are the minority, sometimes a book needs a little work and is just not ready for prime time.

However, The Pale Surface of Things is none of these things. It's a rip-roaring tale filled with action-packed scenes, sun-drenched, romantic locales, mysterious figures, generational secrets, religious men with unresolved romantic issues, gunshots, art restoration, etc. and so on, and so forth, in fact:

ATTENTION HOLLYWOOD! THIS NOVEL NEEDS TO BE A BIG SCREEN MOVIE! MAYBE WITH A FEW SEQUELS EVEN! STARRING SEVERAL MAJOR STARS AND A FEW MINOR STARS ALSO! PLEASE CAST REAL ACTORS AND NOT THOSE WHO BECAME FAMOUS FOR STARRING ON REALITY SHOWS!

ahem. Hollywood, if you're reading this, I have a few other things to talk to you about. Call me.

So basically, this book is accessible, entertaining, and better written than about 90% of the mainstream stuff out there, at least the mainstream stuff that comes across my desk for book reviews. I couldn't put it down, and it was one of those books that when it was over, I kept wondering what the characters were up to for a few more days. Any complaints I have about it are minor: some plot twists are a little too perfect, and perhaps there are a few too many plot twists? But what the hell, it was a great story. And great stories are sadly few and far between, small press or big box publishing house.

To add to the great story, there is a lot to chew on here. Morality, faith, culture, money, politics and academic struggles, successful and failed relationships all play a role in this novel. It's one of those books that if I re-read it, now that I know all the plot twists, I could go back and get a lot of nuance that I didn't previously notice. Apparently it's popular with book clubs, and I can see why; I also think Janey (and whichever lucky Hollywood producer gets her hands on this) has at least five more novels in here somewhere if she would write a sequel, explore the back stories of some of the characters, and go in more depth on a couple of the minor plotlines.

This book is just a place you want to be. So go there.

Slow time, part 2

2008-09-06T09:19:00.000-07:00

In my previous post about the book Slow Time by Waverly Fitzgerald, I said I would do the 12-week process and then report back. Sorry it's taken me so long, but I did do the 12-week process and found it to be really valuable and helpful to me.

At the time I read the book, I had been struggling with where to go next in my personal life and as a writer. I had recently made a lot of changes and had a bit of growth in my non-literary professional life, and I have to admit I kind of struggle sometimes with whether doing these book reviews or my own creative writing really matters to the world at all. In addition, I had lost a valuable but volatile friendship and was in a funk over that, knowing I was part of the problem and self-conscious about how to proceed with new and existing friendships.

So in the midst of change and identity crises galore, during the winter of 2008 I sat down each Sunday morning for twelve weeks, turned off all of the electronic devices I love so much, suspended my usual cynicism about self-improvement, and worked through the activities in Waverly's book. Looking back at my notes now, I see the seeds of the attitudes about time that I have adopted this year, which have made my life a lot more enjoyable and helped me manage stress better.

The book guides you through a process of self-discovery about your ideas and attitudes about time, from your childhood exposure to time to thinking about which times of year important things have happened in your life. I remember being quite free-spirited in my early 20's about time, and now that I am in my mid-30's, married, and have more responsible and satisfying work, I find that I have inadvertently applied the structured time management techniques I use at work to my home life. This has led to a sense of never accomplishing enough at home. If I want to get any writing done, I do need to have some time management at home, but I have learned to be OK with turning off the alarm clock on the weekends and just doing what comes to mind rather than planning each day out hour by hour.

Slow Time also includes a lot of great research about time and attitudes toward time from a variety of authors and cultures. The book is structured so that each chapter looks at time in expanding units. From hours to seasons to lifetimes, along with the personal exercises, Waverly exposes us to a variety of thoughts about time, which kind of helped put my own issues into perspective.

I have come to think that this year, the year I turned 35, is a major turning point in my life. I'm in a good place in my marriage, have a good job and live in a city that I like a lot, and I've been here long enough now to have woven a sort of fabric of daily life, with a variety of friends and familiar routines. At the same time I feel the years shortening, feel like leaving certain activities and attitudes behind, and for the first time am starting to think about how much time I have left on this planet and what I need to do to add depth and growth in my life in regard to the beliefs that have always sustained me but that I have never fully explored. These last few years, I can feel myself moving from a world of possibilities to a land of mindful productivity and service. But mindfulness requires sacrifice in its way, and letting go of youthful passions gave me a great deal of anxiety.

In doing the activities in Slow Time and learning about others' thoughts and attitudes about time, I both broadened my perspective and clarified my own attitudes about how I want to live and what is important to accomplish while relieving some of my anxieties about what I will need to forgo to accomplish these things in the time I have left. It's a wonderful, valuable book and I would recommend it to anyone who is going through change of some kind, or just trying to balance daily life with movement toward lifelong goals while retaining your sanity.

The Clean House and Other Plays

2008-03-18T07:38:00.000-07:00

The Clean House and Other Plays by Sarah Ruhl
Theatre Communications Group, New York, 2006

Let me tell you something about the Midwest. The Midwest is hardcore. You grow up there, like I did, you end up either hardcore normal or hardcore weird.

So when I read the recent New Yorker piece about Sarah Ruhl, who falls into the latter category, I actually put down the magazine halfway through the piece to run to the bookstore to buy a collection of her plays -- the last copy on the shelf. I was drawn to the gentle absurdism described in the article -- wackiness to amuse, instruct, make a point. Absurdism you can relate to.

The collection did not disappoint. In The Clean House, others clean house while the maid tries to think of the perfect joke. In Late: A Cowboy song, a man, a woman and a manly woman move at a horse's pace to a few important realizations. In Melancholy Play, which I think is my favorite so far, melancholy is sexy and tears are meant to be saved. I haven't read Eurydice yet -- I may wait until after seeing it produced by ACT Theatre in Seattle later this year.

Ruhl's first intent was to be a poet, and this comes through in her plays as well. There is a musicality about the dialogue, a lilt. The stage directions are like little presents stashed throughout the play, sweet, suggestive: "It would be nice if the actress playing Red could play the guitar." "Virginia has a deep impulse to order the universe." "An intermission, or not. Preferably not."

In the New Yorker piece, Ruhl talks about the importance of lightness, yeah. Her plays are often described as comedies, and there is a comedic element to each one, but they are too earnest to be dismissed as whimsical jokes. When someone turns into an almond, there is a reason.

Wilderness Alps: Conservation and Conflict in Washington's North Cascades

2008-02-17T16:58:00.000-08:00

by Harvey Manning
ed. Ken Wilcox
foreward by David Brower
published by the North Cascades Conservation Council
2007

Wilderness Alps is a history of the conservation efforts in the North Cascades. I am not an expert in Northwest history by any means, but this seems like a thoroughly researched, detailed account of the years leading up to the formation of the national park and recreation areas in the North Cascades, focusing mainly on the second half of the 20th century. Please note that the NCCC has a stake and some strongly held positions in this issue. Don't read the book looking for an unbiased approach.

Really, though, this is the fun of and genius of the book, which drew me in despite my initial impulse. I am going to come right out and confess to you right now that I am not a nature girl. The only times I have left the city limits in the past six months were to go to meetings or shopping. I live by the lake but I mainly observe it through my front window. I get really cranky if I don't get a shower each day or if someone innocently suggests I should go for a hike that does not involve a really good bakery on the other end.

So . . . when I first received this book to review, I eyed it warily. But it's a beautiful book, physically. The cover photo and design is really lovely -- not too granola-ish. It's got a nice heft. Although it's a paperback, the cover has front and back inside flaps (I love it when this happens! Every book publisher should do this!). There are two substantial sections of color photos, with black and white photos and maps throughout. Mountains are pretty! The book begs to be read.

And it turned out to be an enjoyable read because of its tone and scope. The author, Seattle native Harvey Manning, who died in 2006, was a well known author and conservationist. He successfully manages to combine his passion for conservation with both a sense of humor and a serious call to action. All of this is just seasoning; the bulk of the book is a thoroughly detailed chronicle of the history of the conservation efforts of the region.

Clearly this is a must read for all of you nature kids out there. But I think it can be a really valuable book for those of you coffee shop dwellers who are just trying to understand the nature kids too, who listen warily to those stories of climbing Mt. Baker or spending weeks under the trees, or who, like me, simply marvel at the beauty of the place where we live when you get those glimpses of mountaintops when turning the final corner on your Metro Bus route each day.

Slow Time

2007-12-15T10:56:00.001-08:00

Two major things happened to me in 2007 -- I got a promotion at work and a new couch at home. I spent the year going from work to couch, couch to work. This from a person who spent a major period of life going to school full time, had both a full time and part time job, read in open mics a few times a month, and spent every evening at a rock and roll show when not doing one of those things. Yes, in the past I have made the classic workaholic mistake of taking on too much, burning out, melting down, picking up the pieces, starting over.

2007 would be different. I would survive. So I worked and rested. I did not write, purposely. Outside of the cubicle and the couch, there wasn't much other than the occasional happy hour or dinner out, maybe a movie from time to time. I read The New Yorker every week. I watched a lot of E!. Books and magazines piled up around me, unread. Entire friendships have taken place through text messaging and Facebook. It felt kind of good in a slovenly sort of way. And I survived . . . better than survived, actually.

I completed a major project at work, I kept my marriage healthy, and I even managed to move to a new apartment and get a new job, an ideal job for me at the place in my career where I am right now. I survived 2007 and am in a good place to start 2008 . . . except I have this nagging feeling something is missing.

I haven't done any writing or crafting for a while, and I would like to do both. I'm totally out of shape from sitting on this couch all the time. I'd like to have friends I know in person, because LOL is not actually the same as laughing out loud. I feel I've swung in the wrong direction a little. I need to find a better balance.

So I decided to restart things, one at a time, see what sticks, one thing being this blog. I put out a call for books. Through the mail comes Slow Time: Recovering the Natural Rhythm of Life by Waverly Fitzgerald. I'm not a self-help kind of girl, and my initial reaction to the title is kind of like, eh, sounds like a hippie thing. But I am familiar with Waverly's voice a little, just from a listserv we are both on, and she has never come across as too hippie to me, so I decide to give it a go.

It's a twelve week course designed for "anyone feeling starved for a more spacious and meaningful relationship with time," including "exercises [which] explore different dimensions of time, from the moment to the lifetime." Huh? My original intent is to give it a few hours on a Saturday morning then write it up book review style and move on with my day . . . but wait. I read the introduction, earnest, sincere, straightforward and down to earth. It hooks me. It's relevant to me right now.

And you know what, I'm in charge here in my little corner of the blogosphere; I have no deadlines other than my own. I started this blog so I could read what I want and not have to cater to the whims of some editor who REALLY REALLY wants me to (and will pay me $75 to!) like the new book from the latest greatest who's managed to squeak out a novel in between rehab and graduate school, where she will write a series of short stories about how alienated she feels while in graduate school in my home state, obligatory mentions of cornfields as the epitome of loneliness, no thanks (FYI, there is a lot going on in those cornfields, people, which you would know if you ever got off of I-80 before the campus exit). Go write an article about cigarette butt litter as the next great urban social crisis or something and leave me alone, dear editor.

So here's my first blog back, and you'll hear more about Slow Time in twelve weeks. I've got some other great books to review in the meantime; keep sending them in. I'm excited about the great self-published and small press stuff out there. And I am excited about 2008. It's good to be back.

Recovering the Sacred by Winona LaDuke

2006-10-17T20:33:00.000-07:00

published by South End Press, 2005

If the only way you have heard of Winona LaDuke was through her run for the Vice Presidency on the Nader ticket in 1996 and 2000, pick up this book right away. In fact, I will forgive you if you drift off of my blog completely to run out (or click out) and buy it right now.

Recovering the Sacred is a collection of narratives about various instances when Native Americans have reclaimed traditional lands, practices, and perhaps more importantly, food. LaDuke, a member of the Anishinaabekwe (Ojibwe), is involved in The White Earth Land Recovery Project, a Minnesota project involving Native Americans recovering traditional food production. She was the first, and remains the only, activist/radical politician that I have seen on the Food Network, where she appeared to discuss Ojibwe practice of harvesting wild rice.

Like anyone else who recently went to graduate school for literature, I have read my fair share of activist writing of all stripes, usually pedantic and academic crap that takes a subject matter of great interest and importance and sucks all the life right out of it. However, what struck me the most about Recovering the Sacred was the incredible tone and the craft of writing displayed here. There are a lot of writer-activists out there who are much better activists than they are writers, but in LaDuke manages to both amuse and engender a passionate response both by how she writes as well as the subject matter.

LaDuke uses a dry humor throughout the book as she picks apart the arguments of those who oppose Native Americans' efforts, as when in response to a Vatican Observatory pronouncement (about Native opposition to a large observatory being built on sacred land in Arizona) that they "would like to learn about any such genuine concerns of authentic Apaches" she grabs you with a little mockery, opining, "Ah, the problem of finding 'authentic' Indians," and then follows it up with cold hard facts: "Not that anyone looked very hard. No formal attempts were made to meet with the Apache until four years after the project was had been proposed." Even her subject headings are kind of cute: "Raising Arizona;" in an entry about mining, "Sucking the Mother Dry;" or invoking the aura of classic Western movies, "A River Runs Through It."

So you're drawn in a little by the humor and the clear prose, but what keeps you are the stories. When reading a lot of Native non-fiction, or just thinking about the history of Native Americans, one can easily be left with a sense of hopelessness. But here, LaDuke deals out hope. Each well-crafted, well-researched story is one of Native peoples reclaiming something sacred they have lost, small victories acheived through peaceful, legal means -- quite differently than the way they lost it. It's good writing about activism at its best and most productive.

When You are Born: poems by Sarah McKinstry-Brown

2006-09-26T19:47:00.000-07:00

Sarah McKinstry-Brown's poems always strike me as being essentially female, and female in a way that is obvious to women but quite different from the way women are often portrayed in poetry. The Sarah of poems is bold, insistent, connected to other women, as in "Letter to Frida," when she says:

I'm a hunter
stalking heartbeats

[. . .]

I mistake myself for God,
for Mary,
for Sunday nights,
then for nobody;

As far as I can remember, no male poet has ever mistaken a woman for God in a poem, and the nameless, faceless women in so many poems by men are the hunted, not the hunters.

So, who's perfect, right? An adoring poem from a clueless man is better than no poem (or maybe no man) at all, I guess. But I'm glad Sarah is out there speaking the truth for women, as she also does in "1001 Loads of Laundry," contemplating the work her mother does to keep the family together, or "In the Sixth Month" or "When You are Born," considering her own impending motherhood in a lovely low-maintenance, calming kind of way, genuinely focusing on the togetherness she feels with her child. The voice in these poems is a strong, confident and warm woman's voice, unimpaired by any kind of false femininity.

Bait and Switch by Barbara Ehrenreich

2006-09-18T23:25:00.000-07:00

Please note: Bait and Switch is published by Metropolitan Books, a division of Henry Holt and Company, probably noone's idea of a small press, but I read it and felt a need to write about it, and I am the boss in this little corner of the blog universe. So here goes.

I read the Barbara Ehrenreich book Bait and Switch today, and I am afraid I have no good news to report. I have to admit I went in with a bias, having not really enjoyed the tone of her previous work, Nickel and Dimed, but having read plenty of other articles written by Ehrenreich that I did enjoy. And I was feeling crappy so I took a sick day today, which always makes me cranky thinking about my lost productivity for the week. But since this article online states that B.E. has "never embraced objectivity," why should I?

OK, so, if B.E. were trying to write an indictment of the career coach-job fair-job board-"networking" industry, she did a great job. But she doesn't stop there; she tries to sort of accuse corporate America, or maybe just America in general, of something sinister, I am not sure what. As in Nickel and Dimed, she goes "undercover" with a faked resume, this time trying to get a "white collar" job. I wouldn't expect someone with a faked resume to be able to get a job that she is ultimately trying for (and she doesn't.). She starts out saying she has done a bunch of PR consulting and wants to get a job in the 50K range, which seems doable, but then she goes off the deep end and starts telling people she wants to be an "executive" and make 100K+ a year, applying for jobs as "PR Director" for major pharmaceutical firms and so forth. This from a woman who has never had a full time job, according to her own (faked) resume; even in real life Ehrenreich, who makes a living as a freelance writer, does not have the experience or expertise to be applying for these type of jobs.

But because corporate failure is what she expected to find, she somehow takes the months of failure and humilation as some kind of indictment against a corporate system of some kind. She takes everything she learns from the job hunt industry and extrapolates it onto "corporate America," making a lot of bold pronouncements and calls to action. Some of her ideas, like not having health care tied to one's job, are good ones, and deserve a lot more time in print than they get here -- not to mention the courtesy of being framed by a tighter argument, as the book's central argument, like the argument in Nickle and Dimed, is inherently weak because of Ehrenreich's naivete about the subject matter, her overreliance on anecdotal evidence, and her dogged committment to her predetermined thesis, which she in no way proved. The narcissism of this kind of approach ends up obfuscating the original, noble, purpose of the project.

Oh, and something really sadly ironic . . . Barbara Ehrenreich, the great champion of the working class we are to remember from Nickel and Dimed, has this whole section in her introduction (echoed in her conclusion) in which she talks, without a trace of irony, about people who lost their high paying jobs and are now "reduced . . . to working as a sales associate at the Gap" or "brought low . . . forced to serve behind the counter at Starbucks." No doubt these are noone's ideal jobs, but it seems that B.E., who has just pages earlier painted herself as a champion of the working class (which the book jacket does for us as well), would have a little more tact than to demean those upon whose storied broken backs her last book undoubtedly paid the bills so she didn't have to demean herself by making lattes or selling khaki pants herself. So please, Barbie, call yourself a humorist, but please stop calling yourself an activist.

This book did have one, no doubt unintended, consequence for me, the humble reader, a newly minted member of the middle class. Listening to B.E. and her compatriots' fruitless job searches brought back all the anxiety and depression that I experienced last fall going through my own humble non-executive career transition from sub-academic underling to "administrative specialist," which made me appreciate my current corporate job and my $18.88 an hour plus benefits all year round for me AND my free-spirited husband all the more. So B.E. did not do her job in the least. And now I feel like I may never call in sick again.

The Voyage Out by Virginia Woolf

2006-07-30T12:50:00.000-07:00

While browsing at a used bookstore, looking for Woolf essays, I came across A Voyage Out (1915) and realized that I had never actually read a Virginia Woolf novel. Although the Woolfs did not found Hogarth Press until 1917, in the spirit of Virginia Woolf's contribution to small press publication, I think A Voyage Out deserves a place here.

I have often appreciated the honesty and eccentricity of Woolf's voice as an essayist, and I am not disappointed with my first try at a Woolf novel. Voyage both satirizes and digs into the lives of wealthy Brits of the early 20th century as they travel to South America for a months-long journey. Woolf gives us all the conversation and inertia of a Jane Austen novel with a lot more emotion and a sharper, more insistent critique.

"The Thin Line of What I Know" by Matt Mason

2006-06-16T22:03:00.000-07:00

I grew up in Iowa, a couple of miles from the very border between Iowa and Omaha, Nebraska, which meant for in-state tuition I went to university in Iowa, but far from my home. Therefore, I spent many the hour driving Iowa highways, including I-80. Going back even farther, my mother was raised on a farm, and we spent many the weekend driving back and forth the 50 miles from our place in "the city" to Grandpa's and Grandma's farm. So I know from Iowa scenery, which is why this poem, in Mason's new collection Things We Don't Know We Don't Know, out recently from Backwaters Press, is my new favorite in a long line of my favorite poems of his.

(In the interest of full disclosure, I am also working with Backwaters Press on a book, although a very different kind of book. In addition, you should know that I have been following Mason's poems for years, through many chapbooks. It's important for the integrity of this post that you know that along with Sharon Olds, Kenneth Koch, and Gerard Manley Hopkins, Matt Mason is one of my favorite poets, that he was the featured reader at the first open mic I ever read in, at which he read a poem about Clamato, and everyone in Omaha thinks he is the bomb. i.e. This is not an unbiased review, but a true, heartfelt, and carefully considered one nonetheless.)

About the poem. I now live in the Seattle area, where we have mountains, water, rich and diverse history and contemporary culture, a refreshing lack of evangelical Christians, and really good beer available on every corner. It would be easy, so easy, for anyone to understand the beauty of someplace as postcard pretty as this.

But having grown up in Iowa, I know that this is not the only kind of beauty there is. In Iowa, one works at love, works at beauty, works the land, gets dust in the hair and mud under the fingernails, and feels a great love for one's home state no matter if it is ever mentioned in the media. There is a subltety to the beauty there, but there is a matching restraint to Mason's work that makes the rolling Iowa countryside a perfect subject.

There are two subjects of this poem, actually: my home state and a woman who lives in the capital, a two hour drive from Omaha, a woman who the speaker is driving I-80 to meet. The movement in this poem is both gentle and pressing, mimicking the movement you make driving that 120 or so miles - straight, undulating, quick, safe. The first stanza is full of numbered mile markers, counting the miles until the lovers meet.

The middle three stanzas then move us in a different direction, out over the round wide countryside. First a collection of whimsical, disposable detail, as Mason lists Iowa interstate landmarks like the Purple Martin Train or the water tower in Adair (not from Iowa? Doesn't matter, you get it, right?), all of which speed by at 65 MPH. But then the magic comes: after seven chatty lines of thirdrate sightseeing, from atop the Beebeetown observation tower, our speaker sees "the thin line of what I know/among all the foreign fields and hills/stretching from it like butterfly wings." We climbed more than a few flights of rickety old wooden steps in a middle of a cornfield just then.

Here Mason takes something familiar to his speaker and makes it mystical, makes it mysterious, makes it sing, surprising even the traveler himself. The trip has changed from counting miles before a kiss to wondering what he is passing, to naming rather than numbering destinations along the way, to seeing "trees along the road perform/all their acts: fat, naked, flowering, flaming, green, chainsawed." (Did you hear those sounds? Read it a few times out loud.)

And then, oh yeah, the girl. Our speaker gets back to counting down to her in the last stanza, but now along with the numbers on the mile markers, we have descriptions of the woman, from less to more sensual, until "cornfields fade/into [her] hair." The rapidly approaching woman and the Iowa countryside zipping by have merged, and let me tell you something: this is not a poem written to impress anyone; this is true love.

And this is only one poem in the collection, Mason's first bound book. If you are not as excited about it as I am, I am afraid you have not been paying close enough attention.

Without a Net: the Female Experience of Growing Up Working Class

2006-03-07T21:15:00.000-08:00

I ran across this book, edited by Michelle Tea, while doing a little research for a book review of Tea's new novel. Quite a few of the essays resonated with me. I grew up in a working class neighborhood, and while I had the relative luxury of having two parents who stayed married and both worked, and thus did not have to worry about a lot of things the girls in this book had to worry about (gross stepdads, dog biscuits for dinner, etc.), I was still entrenched in that world. I have always found it pretty hard to find a realistic depiction of working class life in non-fiction writing.

Instead, most of the time you just get people who wish they were working class or poor co-opting the values and aesthetic of the truly poor, which is utter bullshit. Few people would choose to be poor or even working class if they could get just a few bucks more an hour, and most people who feel like they have made that choice are doing so because it was handed down to them through generations. But there is joy in freedom from middle-class expectations as well.

This collection captures both the hunger and the joy, as well as all the corresponding drama of growing up in a working class neighborhood. It illustrates the resiliency of people's spirits, people who have been through so much and also laugh about things and hold their heads high. Most importantly, the collection manages to honestly paint the picture of the various facets of poor and working-class life without using the wide-stroke - Barbara Ehrenreich - if you're-not-me-you're-a-victim style*.

Interestingly, even though she didn't publish herself here, Tea's editorial voice is as clear and vibrant as in her memoirs and new novel. She seems to have found a way to cut through all the poser submissions I am sure she received and really get to the heart of a large pocket of American culture that is so rarely talked about with any kind of honesty or clarity.

*I have long had a few bones to pick with Ehrenreich's book Nickel and Dimed, and Tea kind of slams it in the introduction as well, which I would love to talk to her about if I ever got the chance, since everyone else seemed to think it was such a great book.

The Artist's Reality: Philosophies of Art by Mark Rothko

2006-02-19T22:49:00.000-08:00

OK, so Mark Rothko was not a writer. This is apparent in this recently discovered text, published in 2004 by Yale UP but probably written during the late 1930's or early 1940's. His prose is dense and sometimes circular, he lets his bitterness about other, more commercially successful artists pop up in the middle of seemingly unrelated chapters, and he creates obscure definitions for artistic principles that he doesn't clearly define.

That having been said, The Artist's Reality is still a gem, if only because you get a tiny glimpse into the mind of one of the 20th century's most remarkable painters. Having just read Rothko's "philosophies," I am not sure I understand his work any more than I did before, and readers looking for insight into his color field paintings won't find much in the way of new clarity, as the editor, Rothko's son, warns. But it sure is delightfully bitchy fun listening to him make fun of Maxfield Parrish.

And there are some lovely sentences in this slim text, such as when Rothko proclaims:

Therefore art, like philosophy, is of its own age; for the partial truths of each age differ from those of other ages, and the artist, like the philosopher, must constantly adjust eternity, as it were, to all the specifications of the moment.

There is something really striking about this sentence, because among the meandering construction and totally useless little phrases to trip over like "as it were," there is this tiny gem of a phrase: "must constantly adjust eternity."

The whole book is like that -- a genius who knows his own mind and yet is struggling with words to make it clear. It's really wonderful in its rawness. We have to remember that Rothko himself did not publish the book, maybe for good reason, and did not have the final edit, since the manuscript was (thankfully!) unearthed from his files long after his death.

On Lies, Secrets and Silence by Adrienne Rich

2005-10-10T18:20:00.000-07:00

This is one of those things that has been on my shelf forever and that I finally got around to reading cover to cover. Containing selected essays of Rich's from 1966-1978, this collection contains some of the seminal essays of the Second Wave feminist movement, especially in regards to women and writing or education, including "When We Dead Awaken" and "Toward a Woman-Centered University."

But one of the essays that really touched me personally was "Women and Honor: Some Notes on Lying," which explores, among other things, the issue of privacy. While there is no doubt that privacy is often a good thing, there have been way too many times in my life that I have seen privacy used to oppress, and lying used to perpetuate relationships that should be ended. Especially powerful are Rich's statements against the lies that women are asked to put forward every day to appease the people around them. Consider this: "The liar has many friends, and leads an existence of great loneliness."

This is great comfort to me as I am someone who has often chosen to share my thoughts and stand my ground and has sometimes suffered the consequences for it. Not that it is always right to spill your guts, and I can admit to many circumstances when it would have been better to keep my mouth shut, but it's comforting to know that one of the most prominent women writers of our time has something to say about it.