Mystery Book Revealed

The Mystery Book that's been taking F-O-R-E-V-E-R for me to finish is The Omnivore's Dilemma by Pollan. Pollan tracks the origins of four meals: one from McDonalds, one of "organic" food, one of non-organic food, and one that he hunted and gathered.

The book is long.

Pollan is thorough. With the exection of the fact that he talks about corn for half of the book, I thought the thoroughness was warranted.

But book is very good. Pollan is a good writer, witty, charming, conversational, intelligent.

The reason that it too me so long is because there are definite agendas about this book and it's hard not to internalize them. I had to pause when I found myself seriously considering applying all of Pollan's agendas. For example: corn syrup . . . bad. So I was checking all labels. Industrialized meat: bad. So I was balking at buying frozen chicken breasts at Costco. Lentils from my favorite Indian supermarket: bad, they've been shipped overseas. See? I had to read a little while, pause, let my food habits stabilize, and then go back and read some more. I have changed my buying and eating habits some---I think that's the point---but I didn't want to push myself into culinary neurosis.

Here are some of the changes that I have tried to make:

1. I do, actually, avoid corn syrup. Why does it need to be in processed tomato sauce anyway?

2. I do cook more vegetarian meals. Lentils, beans, that sort of thing.

3. I do try to buy local. I make exeptions for important things like pineapple and chocolate.

4. I do eat free range beef. It's the beef that wanders my dad's back pasture, actually, so I know exactly where the cow was raised.

Here's a sample of food that I think Pollan would approve of:

1. Strawberry jam, made by my mother, from the berries she bought down the road from her house.

2. Beef from my dad's cows. He raises them. Names them---I once had a roommate who wouldn't eat my beef because it had a name. Better than having a number in a feedlot, I say.

3. A nectarine from the farmer's market by my house.

4. Yogurt with no corn syrup.

So now Mystery Book has been completed. It was a lovely feast. Enjoy.

Blackbird Pond

A while ago, I did a top ten post on young adult literature that I thought was worth reading as an adult. I could only come up with nine, and some readers suggested The Witch of Blackbird Pond as a possibility for number ten.

So I finally read it again (while reading another book: you'll still have to wait for that one---Why is it taking Deborah so long? Why doesn't she just finish Mystery Book and get on with it? What's the deal? You'll have to wait and then I'll explain. I'm almost done with Mystery Book. Stay tuned.)

Blackbird Pond was great, of course, and I think it should be read again and again. This is one good example of historical fiction that makes me wonder why more middle school/high school history teachers don't teach historical fiction when they teach history. There's some really good stuff in Blackbird Pond about pre-revolution America, Quakers, Puritans, etc. Had this been an extra credit option when I did American history as a junior in high school, I would have done it. And liked it. And learned from it.

Jenny, I think Emma might be old enough for Blackbird Pond. Certainly as a read-aloud. Would be a good basis for early American history discussion.

I think we miss some of that now

The biography bug hasn't hit me yet; I'm still a fiction gal. But I like to peruse biographies every now and then to see if I've developed a taste for the genre. I recently pored over Linda Lear's Beatrix Potter biography. Titled Beatrix Potter: A Life in Nature. I didn't read all of it, but enough to know that Lear is an interesting writer and a solid researcher. I was most fascinated by how much of Potter's life was spend studying and observing and drawing animals---Potter paid the price for her ability to draw creatures and make them life-like and fantastic at the same time. I think we miss some of that now---it's not in our culture for people to take time to "just" draw and watch. Pity. I think we're missing something.

So then the biography led me, of course, to Potter's fictional children's stories. I knew she wrote Peter Rabbit, but I had not met Timmy Tippytoes or Jemima Puddleduck or Duchess the Dog. These books are adorable! I'm going to put them on my Amazon.com wishlist and collect a bunch. They are not flashy (think: not David Shannon, whose work I adore). They are clever and charming. If you don't want to read the biography, at least venture into some of Beatrix Potter's lesser known fiction. It will delight both the child and the adult in you.

(But Liz, check out the biography. I think you'll like it.)

The problem with blogging about books

The problem about blogging about books is that it takes me a long time to have something to write about in a new post. It's not like a recipe blog where, poof, I can whip something up and TADA! Blog entry!

I'm currently reading three books simultaneously and I'll report on them soon. Some people think this is akin to book adultery, to read three books at the same time. I don't think it's disloyal, just interesting. It's like having three good friends all on speaker phone.

But I can tell you about Schwartz's bestseller, The Commoner. It amazes me what gets on the bestseller lists sometimes. I'd call The Commoner "good", but it's not enough to trip over an electric fence for, which is what "Bestseller List" conjures in my mind: stampeding readers willing to throw themselves in the path of danger just for a glimpse of chapter four. Schwartz writes in a 1st person female voice about the fictional life of a commoner in Japanese society marrying the crown prince.

The story was good, the writing was lovely (artistic even), but it was the voice that threw me off. I haven't yet encountered a male writer who can do a first person female voice that sings for me. Potok tried to do it in Davita's Harp, but it wasn't quite there. I could never put my finger on it in either book: but the narrator in both cases was missing . . . . something. But what it was, I could not say.

But still. Good work, readable. Interesting.

Saddle up

I finally found a book to give hope to Guernsey fans. Honestly, I was worried that I'd never find another good book again and I would wither away, pining.

But saddle up, cowgirls, and get ready for a wild ride. I've found a book that will put the spice back in your chili.

Read These is My Words by Nancy E. Turner. This came recommended from two sources: one, my friend Lys-An, who always finds the good stuff and two, from a woman on a plane who overheard me mention the title and turned around in her seat to tell me that she LOVES this book.

I liked it from the start, and by page eight, I was hooked. The passage that did it was when the narrator, teenage Sarah, is describing how she shot a deer and some other girls in her wagon train are shocked. Sarah says, "They said so many times oh my, oh my, that I thought I might of stood on my head and sang a song it was so strange to them. Well I lived in the territory all my life and I got four brothers and a girl has got to get along."

Hook. Line. Sinker. Right til the very end.

Just trust me. Go find the book. Meg in Sheridan, request that your library buy it.

Religion was the theme. But I wasn't expecting it.

I recently finished the next two books in the Ember series, The Prophet of Yonwood and The Diamond of Darkhold, as well as The Language of Bees by Laurie King.

The Prophet of Yonwood was well written and had an interesting plotline---jumping back to pre-city-of-Ember days. Ah, delicious twist, to take a book in the series backward before you go forwards again. Like a flashback, but with an entire book. Good story, good characters. But anti-religion, so I won't be keeping a copy on my shelves for one of my future teenagers to find. The anti-religion theme isn't overt, which is why it was scary, just as scary as the underlying (but obvious) anti-religiousness of The Subtle Knife by Pullman. DuPrau wouldn't admit that she's anti-religion, but that would be denial.

The Diamond of Darkhold was good. Recommendable if you like the rest of the Ember works. I liked the wrapping up at the end. Left me with a nice sigh of, "Oh. How nice." Since I am usually more likely to argue with an author's ending, this was a pleasant surprise.

As for Laurie King's The Language of Bees: I was excited about this one. Waited for it. Bought the hardback so I could read it on the plane (sans children, thus the reading material). And King clipped right along. King is blindingly intelligent on a range of subjects so it's refreshing when she wanders into places I wouldn't expect: Beekeeping anyone? Norse mythology? Celtic sites?

A joy.

My first complaint, though, is that King (again) played on the "religious organizations/leaders are underhanded" generalization. She's done this before (in Regiment) so I didn't think she'd go there again. Yet off she went.

Trite.

Worse than "The butler did it".

Well written. Well researched. I thoroughly enjoyed the new characters she introduced. But I won't keep a copy on my shelves---for the reasons above, but also because there's more sexuality in this book than I've seen in the others in the series, and legitimizing of relationships with which I don't agree. If any of the above will offend you, skip The Language of Bees. I'll find something just as good for you, but less questionable.

War and Peace

Has anyone actually read Tolstoy's War and Peace? It's sitting on my shelf, daring me to try to get through it again. Meaning: I tried to read it once and stopped. Not meaning: I'm trying to read it another time.

Anyone besides JoBecka.

Because if you can tell me that, really, it's worth reading, I'll try again. If not, I've got a few sci fi that look more interesting.