literature

Book 28 for 2025: “The Barbarian Nurseries”, Héctor Tobar

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Although the copyright says 2011, this book in so many ways continues to describe the different groups of people and cultures that live in Southern California. Even though I know that to which the title refers, I am not sure it really does the book justice. This is the story of a wealthy, young family living in one of the most expensive suburbs in Orange County. The husband, Scott, who is half Mexican, made it as a tech savvy guy. His wife, a transplant from Maine, does not work but stays home with two young boys who go to a fancy private school where she volunteers. They have a baby girl. Taking care of all this is apparently too much for her so they have a live-in maid, Araceli, who has her own little bedroom separate from the big house. Until recently, they had two other people working for them, one young woman who helped with the children and a gardener. Due to money issues, when the book begins, only Araceli is left working for them.

Financial pressures lead to the couple fighting. One morning Araceli awakens to an almost empty house; only the two boys remain. Everyone else has disappeared. She cannot reach the parents; no one is answering the phone. This continues for two days until they are about to run out of food. She has never had to interact with the children much before and is a bit at loss as to what to do. Neither she nor they have a clue as to where the parents are each of whom think the other one is at home. Araceli finds an old photo of Scott’s dad, Señor Torres, with an old address written on the back. She decides to have the boys pack some clothes in their backpacks and they head off to find their grandfather.

Their misadventures and the mistaken accusations that follow show just how crazy things can get when people totally misunderstand what has occurred, people cannot think correctly due to their prejudices, and the wrong people get involved. Since I live in Southern California and have been to some of the places described or places similar, this book rang so true for me and made me laugh out loud and keep on reading.

Book 27 for 2025: “Violeta”, Isabel Allende

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Although technically not a sequel, “Violeta” seems to be a sort of sequel to “A Long Petal of the Sea”. If you are interested in Chilean history just before, during, and after the demise of Chilean president Salvador Allende and the horrors of Pinochet’s rule which the CIA helped to implement, this novel is for you.

This is the story of one woman, Violeta, told from her viewpoint via a long memoir written for and to her grandson. She begins life as the youngest child of a wealthy businessman whose poor and risky decisions lead to the family’s downfall, forcing them to escape to the remote, far southern regions of the country. It is the tale of a strong, passionate, determined woman who lived a lifestyle far ahead of her time, other family members, the far right Hitler sympathizing German farmers who immigrated to the far south, and others she knew including a renegade pilot who flew contraband and “prisoners” for various nefarious groups. Although not a murder mystery or a work of fiction that could be called adventurous, the story of Violeta’s life is so fascinating that I kept wanting to read on and on.

Book 26 for 2025: “How the World Eats”, Julian Baggini

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Although the subtitle says “A Global Food Philosophy”, most of it is an analysis of actually how the world does eat, including some rather remote tribal people, rarities in this contemporary world. This how also includes an analysis of how food affects health in different parts of the world, noting that although contemporary recommendations push vegetables and the Mediterranean diet, some people have no access to vegetables and eat mainly meat and fat and remain healthy. In other cases, like the Masai, cattle provide everything in their diet. The reader gets a broad based view of the best and the worse of diets and food practices worldwide.

A substantial portion of this tome–it is nearly 400 pages long with notes and index of more than 50 pages, looks at industrialized nations and world food supply, including the monopoly large food producing corporations maintain over what is available at grocery stores. Food is big business. The different definitions of food processing is covered as well as the good and bad. He debunks some common beliefs about food and health and notes that while people go hungry in some parts of the world, there is a surplus of food in others.

After all the analyzing and discussions, the last chapter covers “A Global Food Philosophy”. This includes recommendations for what we can do to create a healthier and more equitable worldwide food system while also saving the environment. He lists seven principles one of which is that our food management should be compassionate toward animals if we are going to eat them.

Books 24 and 25 for 2025: “Song Yet Sung”, James McBride and “The River Is Waiting”, Wally Lamb

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“Song Yet Sung” is the final book for me for McBride. I have now read all his books. Like most of his novels, this one is historical, taking place when slavery still existed. Here the setting is the coastal/tidal areas of Maryland and Virginia where many of the men make a living on the water harvesting seafood. This includes both whites and blacks, slaves and free. At least one escaped slave lives in the swamps where no one has been able to find him. One of the characters is an attractive, tough, ruthless woman who makes her living hunting down escaped slaves and sometimes even capturing freemen and selling them South as slaves. Another is a retired slave hunter who cannot get over the death of his son. Finally there is a widow who owns several slaves but totally depends on them for her living, one of whom is a major character in the novel. I had no idea how people lived in this area of the country, the codes, both slaves and free persons, used to survive and sometimes escape. There is a lot of violence in this novel but also plenty of hope and redemption.

“The River Is Waiting” has made it to the top ten fiction list for the last couple of weeks. Without doubt it has to be one of the most depressing novels I have ever read. A young man who hides his addictions causes a horrible, tragic accident. Sent to prison where he really does not fit in at all, he experiences many horrific events but also has a cell mate who is a kind and caring person. Add to this the two hideous, sadistic prison guards and their actions and you have a tale of woe relieved occasionally by acts of honor, beauty and kindness.

Note: Decades ago when I worked at a DOE facility where everyone had to take a psychological test to get a clearance to work there, a specialist came to give us a presentation on the test and how the results were used. As I read “The River Is Waiting”, I kept remembering something the presenter told us: when a test was given at a maximum security prison, the guards scored higher on hostility and anger than the inmates.

Book 23 for 2025: “A Long Petal of the Sea”, Isabel Allende

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If you do not want to read history books but want to know some history, many of Isabel Allende’s novels will be perfect for you. The title of this one comes from Pablo Neruda; it is what he called his native land, Chile. Each chapter begins with a quote from several of his poems. The novel begins during the Spanish Civil War; one of the main characters, Victor Dalmau, is a medic for the Republican side. He and Roser, a pregnant young widow who was married to Victor’s brother who is killed, have to escape Spain to save themselves. The novel details their struggles crossing into France, how they are forced to marry in order to board the SSWinnipeg, a ship commissioned by Pablo Neruda to help Spanish refugees emigrate to Chile. With 2000 other passengers they arrive in Chile and make the best of their new life. World War II breaks out and their hope of returning to Spain diminishes.

Victor becomes a successful doctor, their lives become intertwined with that of a prominent Chilean family, Roser becomes a famous musician, traveling back and forth to Venezuela, and the socialist government of Salvador Allende is overthrown in a military coup with the aide of the US. Then Pinochet’s reign of terror comes, once again civil unrest affecting their lives.

The novel demonstrates how little control people sometimes have over what happens to them, how some are better at dealing with adversity than others, and how lies are eventually discovered. It is also a testament to personal character and strength.

Note: Isabel Allende’s father was a distant cousin to Salvatore Allende.

Book 22 for 2025: “The Wind Knows My Name”, Isabel Allende

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This novel details the lives of several immigrants fleeing violence in their own countries. One is a five year old boy in Austria whose father disappeared during the beginning of the Holocaust and whose mother put him on one of the Kindertransport trains from Nazi-occupied Austria to eventually reach England. He never sees her again. All he was allowed to take is one change of clothes and his violin.

Another is Leticia who is now a US citizen; she was carried on her father’s back across the Rio Grande after they escaped the El Mozote massacre in El Salvador, only because they were out of town when when paramilitary men came and killed everyone in their village.

The third is Anita, a blind, eight year old girl whose mother brought her to the US from El Salvador to escape threats on her life from a former military officer who was dismissed because of his behavior. She is separated from her mother by US officials and taken first to a detention center and then later to various “foster” shelters for such children.

Other characters include Selena, a woman working for a non-profit that helps such children and Frank, the high powered attorney she convinces to help her with Anita’s case. The novel illustrates how so many lives intersect and inter-relate in ways no one ever expected.

Book 21 for 2025: “A Trip of One’s Own: Hope, Heartbreak, and Why Traveling Solo Could Change Your Life”, Kate Wills

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This book was not quite what I expected. It is somewhat memoir in that she talks about her career as a journalist accompanied by photographers and such which is not really on your own, about her marriage and divorce, the new guy, and actually traveling on her own. However, a large part of it, which is quite fascinating, is the history of the solo women travelers in history starting with the nun Egeria, who wrote about her own travels throughout the Middle East in the years AD 381-384. Centuries later the book, “Itinerarium Eerie”, provides the details of her journeys and her “boundless curiosity”.

The book provides details of the adventures of many women who traveled solo: Emily Hahn, Nellie Bly, Martha Gellhorn–once married to Hemingway, Annie Londenberry, Gertrude Bell–the first woman to ride by camel across the Empty Quarter in Saudi Arabia, Helena Swanwick, Ethel Smyth, Jean Baret–the first woman to circumvent the globe, Isabelle Eberhardt, Elspeth Beard. I realized in reading this I had actually read about one of these women, Sarah Hobson, who rode all over Persia (Iran) on horseback disguised as a man and have read several books about Gertrude Bell. In the 1700s, Jeanne Barat sailed around the world on a scientific expedition disguised as a man. In 1983, Elspeth Beard circumvented the globe on a motorcycle to heal the trauma she had suffered. Others rode bicycles, some used various forms of navigation, but all defied the norms of their time. Many encountered all sort of dangers and nearly died.

Yes, the book does give women advice on how to travel safely alone, what to pack, etc. And toward the end she tells the reader how to find adventures nearby in the countryside or streets where you live, how to open the eyes and ears, all the senses, and notice your surroundings in new ways.

Book 20 for 2025: “The Color of Water: A Black Man’s Tribute to His White Mother”, James McBride

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I will confess that I read this book before when it first came out decades ago. This past week, I reread it because several women on the street where I live decided to start a book club and this is our first book. McBride’s mother was a remarkable woman who grew up under horrible conditions in the South. Her father, an orthodox rabbi, did not love his crippled wife and made everyone work hard. He was more obsessed with money than religion. Jews were not very welcome where they lived and McBride’s mother found more acceptance and understanding among their Black neighbors. She escapes to NYC, meets and marries a Black, Christian man, converts, and they start a church together. He dies suddenly; she is left with their many children and works hard to make sure her children are successful, sending them off to schools where they are often the only children of color. Then she marries another man and has more children so there are 12 children. This remarkable woman makes sure all of her children go to good schools, go to college, and become successful while she works at what most would consider menial jobs. In this book McBride details not only his own growing up but also the history of his mother and his siblings. It is a remarkable tale of one woman’s determination to keep going, educate her children, and never give up no matter the circumstances.

Book 19 for 2025: “Tell Me Everything”, Elizabeth Strout

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This latest Strout novel takes the reader back to Crosby, Maine, the site of most of her other novels. The same cast of characters appear, Olive, the Burgess boys, Lucy, William, Margaret, and all the others. This one, however, has a new twist, a heinous murder occurs. The most obvious suspect is the victim’s reclusive son who lived with her. Bob Burgess is hired as his lawyer. Lucy starts visiting Olive and they tell each other stories about people they have known , what Lucy calls “unrecorded lives”. Meanwhile, Lucy keeps asking, “What does anyone’s life mean?” Lucy and Bob take walks every week, spending the time talking about all the things they feel they cannot talk about with anyone else. William becomes more obsessed with the parasites he is studying and never quits talking about them.

This, like all of Strout’s novels, focuses on relationships, the good and the bad, and how they sustain us, sometimes transform our lives, sometimes nearly ruin us. Although, readers do not have to read her novels in sequence and this one could be read alone, I think it would make more sense to the reader to at least read three others first: “Olive Kitteridge”, “The Burgess Boys”, and “Oh, William”.

Strout has a unique, easy to read style, that is both simple and profound. She talks about people as they are with empathy and concern. She talks about the many forms of love–“…it is always love. If it is love, then it is love.”

Book 18 for 2025: “The Great Hippopotamus Hotel”, Alexander McCall Smith

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After reading 17 serious books to date this year, I decided it was time to read something lighter and found this latest in the No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency series at the library. If you are looking for lighter reading, sort of mystery stories without murders, and insights into a different culture, Botswana, this series is for you. Start with at least several near the beginning of the series so you get to know all the main characters to fully appreciate what occurs and who’s who.

This novel gets its name from a traditional hotel located way out in the countryside far from city. It is a relaxing place with a lovely veranda and native gardens full of flowers and succulents. Strange things begin to occur–food poisoning, scorpions in rooms, laundry disappearing from the clothes line–too many for it to be by accident. The hotel manager comes to see Mma Ramotswe and Mma Makutsi for help. At the same time Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni has a male client who asks him to find him a fancy, red, Italian sport car without his wife knowing anything about it. With their customary good humor and kindness, these characters set out to solve the problems of the hotel and deal with the sports car issue.

As usual in this series, one learns that quite often people accuse the wrong person, that things are often not as they seem, and that your own prejudices and inclinations can lead you totally astray.