violence

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 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 17 for 2025: “Songs for the Flames”, Juan Gabriel Vasquez

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The characters in the eight stories of this collection are people touched by violence of one sort or another, reflective of the violence that has occurred in Colombia’s history. A photographer’s obsession for a woman with a traumatic past, a writer’s fascination with the history of a woman whose grave is outside the official cemetery, two people whose own personal shared histories meet at a grandiose ceremony pretending they do not know each other–are examples of all the tales of complexity found in life and how morals change over time. These are not stories for the faint of heart. They do reveal how traditions of the past harmed people in ways that do not occur today, how lies can catch up with the liar, and how often pretending to be someone you are not often fails.

Book 16 for 2025: “The Blue Hour”, Paula Hawkins

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Given the nature of the previous book I read by this author and this novel, I have come to the conclusion that she likes to create seriously disturbed, dysfunctional characters. The setting helps with the “mystery”–a somewhat remote island which really is not an island except when the tide comes in. Only one house with only one inhabitant, a steep wooded slope that ends in a rock outcrop with a long plunge to the sea, the disappearance twenty years before of the philandering husband of the famous artist who lived there, and now a lonely, strange, old woman living there alone add to the atmosphere. The relationships among several other characters reveal the continued class structure of British society, its effects. and add to the unsettling nature of the story. To top it all off, a gruesome discovery is made about an art exhibit of the deceased, famous artist who once lived on the island. Although not classified as a mystery, this really is several bizarre mysteries combined. If you like British stories, art, and mystery novels, you will like this novel.

Book 15 for 2025: “Jack”, Marilynne Robinson

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Last year I read her novel “Gilead” which takes place in fictional, small, Iowa town in which the main character is the father of the main character in this novel, “Jack”. John Ames Boughton, Jack, is the wayward son of a Presbyterian minister. Previously, he has been wrongly imprisoned for a theft he did not commit. He loves literature, especially poetry. He lives off of odd jobs, drinks too much, smokes, and is somewhat of a lost soul who continuously philosophizes about live, religion, and societal rules. One day he sees a woman walking in the rain. When she drops her bundles on the sidewalk, he helps her. She thinks he is a preacher because of the way he is dressed and invites him in for tea. She is Della Miles, a teacher and the daughter of a Black Methodist minister. This is the story of interracial love when it was still illegal in the US, the lengths they go to resist and hide it, and the reactions of her family. Reading this, one realizes how it was not that long ago that most of the US was not only segregated, but sometimes even talking to someone on the sidewalk from another race could get a person into trouble with the police.

The Angel

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Can you call yourself a creative writer if you have not written a word in months? I have a friend who promotes 20 minutes of writing per day, telling people to just write, forget quality, just write. Really?! I care about quality. Perhaps too much? I make sure to read quality writing 99.99% of the time. Is this just words I am writing here or is it quality or garbage? You tell me!

One thing I can do is read. I’m good at reading. And singing. And gardening. I talk to plants; that’s why they grow for me. I truly care. They bring me peace and joy.

In the last two months, I’ve read three collections of short stories, two by Anthony Doerr and one by Gayle Jones. Normally, I am not a short story reader, but here I am reading these. Talk about different. It’s almost like these two famous writers inhabit different planets. Doerr’s stories seem intensely emotional, often a bit fantastical and heart wrenching with a lush, descriptive, poetic style even though Doerr is not a published poet. Jones is a published poet, yet her stories are blunt, conversational, often first person and sometimes short–one page short.

In many, a character is telling his or her (most of the stories are her) story about where they are, some experience, somebody they knew, what they did or said. In one story the narrator says she’s an angel, explains where she’s been, whom she’s known, and ends up by asking readers if they’ve seen her near the Seine. I doubt anyone mistakes me for an angel.

Note: Book 13 for 2025 is “Butter”, Gayle Jones. A collection of short stories.

Book Ten for 2025: “Four Seasons in Rome”, Anthony Doerr

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If you have ever felt enchanted by a trip to Rome, you will find this memoir delightful and informative. It made me want to return just to stay a while, wander around, visit the more obscure places Doerr describes, people watch, eat, and drink local wine.

In 2007, Anthony Doerr, the 2015 Pulitzer Price Winner, won the Rome Prize to become a fellow at the American Academy in Rome. He and his wife, Shauna, moved to Rome with their newborn twins, Owen and Henry. This memoir memorializes the four seasons they spent living there. They learn to care for babies; wander throughout Rome visiting tourist sites, local restaurants, the butcher, the baker, the toy store; learn enough Italian to acknowledge all the Italians who stop to admire the babies; and attend the vigil for the dying Pope John Paul II.

While there intending to write his later novel (the one that eventually won the Pulitzer) and failing to do so, he does manage to write a short story which I have read in one of his collections and to read everything by Pliny the Elder. His discussions about his readings makes me want to read some of Pliny the Elder myself. As in his short stories and novels, Doerr’s descriptions, language, and observations delight and enchant. This is a wondrous book about one of the world’s oldest and most fascinating cities which he calls, “a Metropolitan Museum of Art the size of Manhattan with no roof, no display cases…

Book Nine for 2025: “Martyr”, Kaveh Akbar

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“She was Christian but American Christian, the kind that believed Jesus just needed a bigger gun”–part of the description of the main character’s rich, not dentist mom rich but oil, trust fund rich, blue-eyed, blond girlfriend. Cyrus, the main character is an Iranian American whose father immigrated to the US when Cyrus was a baby after Cyrus’ mom was killed when the US shot down an Iranian passenger plane thinking it was a bomber (July 1988). His dad acquires a job at a Midwestern chicken farm, counting eggs, but special eggs. This farm breeds chickens to grow faster to get to market faster. He works six days a week, long hours, until Cyrus, who excelled in elementary and high school, becomes a sophomore in college. Suddenly, his dad dies.

Cyrus becomes an addict using alcohol and drugs and writes poetry and eventually finishes college. He becomes obsessed with and researches martyrs throughout history–people like Hypatia of Alexandria, Bhagat Singh, Emily Wilding Davison, the Soulit Women. He gets sober and obsessed with his own past. This eventually leads him to travel to Brooklyn to talk to a famous artist whose last exhibit is herself talking to visitors as she dies of cancer. In researching this woman’s paintings, he discovers a strange painting of a young man dressed as an angel whose job as a soldier is to ride at night with a flashlight through the fields of the dead and dying Iranian soldiers consoling them during the Iran/Iraq War. Cyrus knows that his mom’s brother had this actual job during that war and wonders can there be a possible the connection.

Throughout these events the reader is lead to not only explore Cyrus’ thoughts and beliefs but also those of his father, mother, uncle, and best friend, Zee. It is rare for a novel to be both heart wrenching and funny. Akbar accomplishes this task. One moment I found myself laughing out loud and the next almost in tears. I could not stop reading even though the paperback is long. Perhaps my knowing something about Iranian culture, food, etc. helped me appreciate some of the book more than I might have otherwise. Nevertheless, this is a universal story about love, discovering oneself, relationships, parenthood, human nature. It is definitely worth taking the time to read.