So Brave, Young, and Handsome

I first came across Leif Enger about a year ago when I picked up his first book, Peace Like a River at my library's annual summer book sale. I devoured the thing in about three days. It was one of those books that draws you in and won't let you go until you reach the final page. And even then you can't stop thinking about it, and it becomes a part of you, coloring your future reading experiences. Enger is an ingenious storyteller. He managed to take an average young boy in the 1960s, his miracle-performing single father, convicted murderer older brother, and Western-epic-poetry-writing little sister (who is quite possibly the most awesome character ever created, reminiscent of Scout in Harper's Mocking Bird) and create a magically epic journey out West.

So I had high expectations when I saw he had written a new novel. So Brave, Young, and Handsome did not let me down. Again, I finished it in three nights. I found myself staying up until midnight or 1 a.m. just to find a good stopping place. But alas, there was no "good" place. The storyline just galloped on like the tireless cowboys and their faithful steeds in the book.

I'm not a Western fan. I've watched maybe one Western movie in my life. So the idea of reading about a retired cowboy-turned-train robber normally wouldn't interest me all that much. And maybe it was partially thanks to the main character, a one-hit-wonder author struggling to complete a successful second novel, that my attention was initially grabbed. But in all honesty, Monte Beckett is the lamest character in the book. Redstart, his energetic 11-year-old son; Susannah, his artist wife; Glendon Hale, the gentle, mild-mannered train robber and murderer; Charlie Siringo, the determined Pinkerton detective; and Hood Roberts, the 16-year-old mechanic turned Western desperado are all brimming with life and adventure and give the book soul. (Not to mention some awesome names--Redstart, Hood? Genius.)

It's rare to come across a book so new and fresh. While it plays on a lot of old Western elements, it's really a modern work and reaches out to anyone who enjoys a good adventure tale, romance, comdey, or tragedy. Leif Enger and his first two books are definitely on my must-read shelf. Now I just have to wait for the next one.

Harry Potter

I did start to read Tristram Shandy a few months ago, as I said in my last post. But having already read it once, I lost interest about 100 pages in. I went through a bit of a dry spell after that, and didn't read much of anything, to be honest. And then Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows pt. 2 came out in theatres. I immediately knew that I needed to reread the series, since I had only read Books 3-7 once, as they were published, with big gaps in between. So in a matter of two weeks I reread Books 1-3. It was a blast revisiting Hogwarts, and I found I had forgotten a lot of things, like Peeves the Poltergeist and trips to Hogsmeade. I still intend to reread the rest of the series, but I'm taking a bit of a break at the moment.

I stopped by Border's this weekend to check out their going-out-of-business sale. Talk about paradise for a book nerd like me! I totally geeked out for about an hour, until the store closed, combing the half-off bookshelves for authors or titles that looked familiar. So my next few posts, in no particular order, will be on the following books:

So Brave, Young, and Handsome by Leif Enger
World Without End by Ken Follett
The Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver
The Autobiography of Mrs. Tom Thumb by Melanie Benjamin
Contemporary American Short Fiction selected by Joyce Carol Oates

The Jungle

I started this sister-blog with such high hopes, plenty of gusto in my wings, ready to take the literary world by storm! And here I am, almost exactly 6 months later, and only one post to show for it.

Oops.

And I can't blame it on not having read anything. Because I have been reading all that time. I just never got around to telling you about it.

But now I'm here, sitting cross-legged in my big yellow saucer chair, and wearing my librarian reading glasses, so you know I'm really serious. This is take two for the reading blog. Cross your fingers and toes that it works better this time!



You know those classic books that you always hear about or see mentioned in different places? And you think, "Hm, I should really read that some time," every time you see it. And you know it's a "classic" (whatever that means) and it's had some huge impact on literature and the world? But you just never get around to it? Well let me tell you a little secret: they're usually some of the best books you'll ever read. Turns out the great literary canon gods know what they're doing after all.

We've had The Jungle by Upton Sinclair laying around the house for a couple years now. I would see it every few months and think I should give it a try, but I would usually put it off until I was done with my current book, or I would just plain forget. Well, I finally picked it up and read it. And it was really good.

The story of Jurgis Rudkus and his family--Lithuanian immigrants to the US in the early 1900s--is heart-wrenching and downright painful to read at times. Pretty much everything bad that could happen to a person happens to Jurgis, and then happens again a few times. Sinclair's main purpose in writing the novel was reportedly to expose the deplorable conditions in which immigrants lived and worked, and how horribly they were taken advantage of by the wealthy businessmen who monopolized the country's power and money. Hence Jurgis's terrible bad luck throughout the story. He is the entire immigrant population embodied in one cursed man. Lemony Snicket could learn a thing or two from Sinclair.

Of course, Sinclair failed in this agenda, and what really stood out to the American public were his detailed descriptions of what exactly was going into the food they ate. Diseased animals, body parts that would be deemed inedible by most dogs, and even the occasional unfortunate worker who fell into a vat of something or other and drowned, never to be recovered. These descriptions ended up making The Jungle one of the first American novels to really cause a political reaction. President Theodore Roosevelt (who apparently didn't like Sinclair and thought he was lying through his teeth regarding most of the things he wrote about) felt compelled by the public outcry to look into the situation. What the Labor Commissioner found revolted him, and led to the eventual passing of The Meat Inspection Act and the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906--which led to the development of the modern FDA.

While I am grateful that all of this took place (I don't really want to be eating tubercular cows on a daily basis), I do find it ironic that this was the effect Sinclair's novel had on the publice. A novel that was supposed to be about realizing the greed and corruption of the head honchos of the meat packing industry, and the dire conditions being forced on the poorest and most vulnerable Americans, ended up appealing to the general public's own personal best interests. They could care less about the struggling immigrant class; they just wanted to make sure they're own meat was clean.

Maybe it's easier for me, as a modern reader to not be as phased by the, admittedly, disgusting food issues outlined in the novel and focus on Jurgis and his lot in life. I know (or think I know) that my food is much safer and purer than what Sinclair describes. And so I do feel Sinclair's outrage at the treatment of Jurgis and his immigrant friends. However, I will admit that I have second thoughts now, every time I eat something that didn't come from my dad's garden!



Coming up next: Laura rereads The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman. I guess I'm just on an old-school literature kick lately. Until next time, Happy reading!

Traveling Mercies : Some Thoughts on Faith

Alright, so I've finally finished a book that I liked and can give a good review. So thus starts blog #2--on a good note. Because that's how all blogs should start. Otherwise you run the risk of entering the emo blogosphere. And that's not a place I want to be.

I have to admit that I cheated a little bit. I've read Anne Lamott before. I read Bird by Bird a number of years ago at the suggestion of ... well, I can't exactly remember who suggested it. Possibly my high school English teacher. It's a book about writing. As soon as Lamott talked about the little voice in her head that constantly told her she was no good and would never be any good, so she should just stop now before she wasted her time and embarrassed herself, I was hooked. I have the same voice in my head.

So I knew when I picked up the book that I would probably enjoy it. Lamott is funny. Laugh out loud, sarcastic funny. I think I startled the cat multiple times last night as I finished up Traveling Mercies while curled up in bed. She is so blatantly honest and crazy that you can't help but love her in spite of, or perhaps because of, all of her self-proclaimed shortcomings--she is probably the world's worst mother, she says, as well as (on a more serious note) a recovering alcoholic and drug addict.

And, despite her mightiest efforts to the contrary, she is a Christian. A part-Jewish, -Buddhist, -southern Baptist, -Catholic Christian, but a Christian nonetheless. And her faith is what saves her over and over again, as parents and friends die, unexpected pregnancy arrives, and she single-handedly raises a young son, sobers up, and alternately fails and prospers in the writing world. (Although to be honest she has succeeded in that scary place more than most could ever hope to, publishing seven novels and five nonfiction books.)

Knowing that this book was about faith and God made me a little nervous. Knowing Lamott and her style already, I wasn't sure how God and sarcasm would work together. But I figured it couldn't hurt my own faith at this point, and maybe--just maybe--it would help. And I think it did help, a little. It showed me that it's okay to work out a faith that works for you, even if it isn't by-the-book Protestant or Catholic, or even necessarily completely Christian. And that is reassuring.

And anyway, it was refreshing to read good, solid, flowing prose that actually had a point and arrived there fluidly, without a lot of unnecessary hemming and hawing in between. I usually avoid nonfiction. But Anne Lamott presents one very big exception.