Cluster Critiques

Leonardo da Vinci by Walter Isaacson

If Leonardo da Vinci had been a baby-boomer, he would have been picked “most popular,” “most handsome,” and “best dressed” in high school, then showed up at his 25^thclass reunion dressed in a purple suit with his young, beautiful, blond wife named James. 

Leonardo’s long-time apprentice and boyfriend’s name was actually Giacomo, which roughly translates from Italian as James, but that doesn't really matter. What is important about Leonardo de Vince (the man, not the book) is that he was uncompromising, and he bridged art and science, much like another Italian polymath with whom I'm infatuated, Galileo Galilei, who brilliantly, and at great risk, managed to span science and religion. 

What is important, about Leonardo de Vinci (the book) is that Walter Isaacson, a lauded documentarian of hyper-visionary super men like Benjamin Franklin, Albert Einstein and Steve Jobs, twines vague marginalia, scattered references and exquisite drawings into a page-flipping story about an irresistibly cool guy.

For example,  Leonardo was worshipped as an artist, but he rarely if ever completed a commissioned piece of art. He worked on the Mona Lisa for 16 years and never considered it finished. Also, he was a master at drawing and painting the human anatomy because he dissected humans (sometimes even when they still alive) to study muscles, inside out and moving. And despite all this, he somehow managed to live a relatively luxurious, unimpeded lifestyle, whiling away his hours (even years) simply observing and wondering about things like the flow of water and clouds. 

I had to tamp down my jealousy of de Vinci’s capacity to live life on his own terms, but it didn’t diminish my enjoyment of this book. Even my hubby, who tilts more towards Stephen King and Michael Connelly, loved Leonardo de Vinci, and I believe you will too.

The Moleskin Mystery by Anonymous (Turk Pipkin)

 

A writer, an actor, a juggler and a philanthropist walk into a bar. His name is Turk Pipkin.

It seems talented people possess or have a special capacity to build multiple talents and skills, while the rest of us struggle to simply survive. Turk Pipkin the not so anonymous author of The Moleskin Mystery is one of those people, but this isn’t about Turk, so I’ll move on.

The story begins when a guy walks into a New Orleans bar the time of day when only a few lost souls and vampires perch. As he climbs onto a bar stool, so obviously weighed down by some melancholia yet undisclosed, he is beckoned by a mysterious pocket-size, mole-skin-covered journal sitting in front of him on the bar. As if by destiny, he picks up the journal and begins adding his chapters of lost love and self-discovery. 

What starts out as obtuse yet clever Kerouac/Burroughs-ish navel-gazing soon takes shape as a nourishing story set in romantic, steamy New Orleans. What’s the mystery? The characters are. The finder of the journal is a mystery. Who is he? Where’d he come from? His love interest, Emilia, is a mystery. Who is she really? What happens to her? And what about Marvin, the oracular seer who speaks in riddles and seems to live in the bar where "nobody knows your name"? 

Of course good writing is important, but for me, enjoyable literature is even more so about complex characters I can have feelings for – love hate, sympathy, empathy, curiosity, whatever. Otherwise they are just an irritating distraction. In Moleskin, it isn't the quantity of what Pipkin tells us about the characters - that's the mystery element of his book. It is the quality of what he tells us that makes The Moleskin Mystery part fairy-tale, part fable, and 100% charming.

Red Notice: A True Story by Bill Browder

Eventually tiring of college binge-drinking and womanizing, the rebellious main character of Red Notice decides to drive a stake into the heart of his communist-leaning family tree by getting an MBA from Stanford and becoming a ruthless capitalist, in Russia, which had only recently realigned from a communist dictatorship to a capitalist order!  Ha! That’ll show ‘em! 

With a keen eye for opportunity, a mathematician’s mind and more than a little luck, our protagonist quickly rises to the top of the financial world in a sequence of Russian investment scenarios so exciting and intriguing, and which afforded him a lifestyle so enviable, I couldn’t wait to get to the next chapter!  But the powerful Russian oligarchy - the Mafioso-like families who took over most of the businesses previously run by the Russian state -  didn’t like the idea of someone other than them, especially an American, making millions of dollars off the growing pains of their country’s privatization transition.

Being the rebel he is, however, instead of taking the hint that he’s not wanted in Russia, our American rebel sticks out his chin, eventually losing everything when he denied reentry into Russia and his assets are seized, his lawyer is taken prisoner, tortured and killed in a new Russian Gulag, all his Russian allies end up similarly suspiciously dead, and his and his family’s lives are threatened. But our rebel doesn’t give in, he continues his fight in America, and although it takes years and a relentless campaign, he ends up convincing US Congress to pass a law imposing sanctions against Russia.

Did you happen to notice the "A True Story" in the book title? Yep, author Bill Browder is the rebel and protagonist of this book.

Red Notice had me from beginning to end, but for reasons I probably don’t want to acknowledge, when Bill Browder went from brilliantly conniving to capitalize on investment opportunities in Russia, to avenging his lawyers murder, his story started to feel more along the line of his rebellion against his family (I’ll show you) than about altruism. Although some will disagree, I was never convinced that he cared about the people who died trying to defend him. It just felt like revenge, and that made the final 1/3 of the book seem less authentic.  

Read it? Sure. It’s an intriguing glimpse into the mechanics of a country’s infrastructure transition from communist to capitalist Russia, and a glimpse into predatory capitalism that knows allegiance to no country. 

Cluster Critiques 8-13-22

 

Last Dance on the Starlight Pier: A Novel by Sarah Bird

Texas Author Sarah Bird is not just an exceptional writer, she’s also a keen chronicler of unnoticed or forgotten histories. For example, in Daughter of a Daughter of a Queen, she gave us the beautifully fictionalized, yet true story of an African American slave woman, Cathy Williams, who, disguised as a man served as a Union soldier in the Civil War.

 

In Bird’s new book Last Dance on the Starlight Pier, she takes us into the outwardly glamourous, inwardly gritty world of depression-era dance marathons and vaudeville, the wildly popular entertainment mediums during that period. Bird also primarily sets the story in Galveston, which during Prohibition was the center of illegal gambling and boozing, replete with Mafia rule. An important backdrop to the story is the election of Franklin D. Roosevelt as President of the US, a watershed moment in American history. 

 

Main character Evie Grace Devlin, raised in the seedy business of vaudeville and in the red light district of “Vinegar Hill” in Houston, is exploited by her self-absorbed mother, but is a survivor fighting to escape her heritage. Despite training to become a nurse, through a twist of fate she joins a troupe of marathon dancers scraping out a living dancing almost nonstop to distract depressed and desperate families from the harsh realities of the Great Depression. The marathon dancers and the Galveston mob team up for a grand dance marathon event at the aging Starlight Pier Ballroom jutting out over Galveston Bay, but things go terribly wrong. 

Bird lures us in with this ripe setting and vivid characters, then stuns us with an unexpected and courageous twist involving Evie and her charming, handsome love-interest Zave, the heart-throb of the dance marathon scene. Last Dance on the Starlight Pier is a time-machine that will transport you to a unique and intriguing era. It will also make you a partner to the story. You'll swoon over Zave, pull for Evie Grace, see the lighted pier against the Galveston sunset, and feel the desperation and faith of the families living through the depression. And as you read the last few pages you’ll be a little sad knowing both the era and the story are coming to an end. Read Last Dance on the Starlight Pier. (Photo is of a depression-era Galveston dance marathon)

 

Moonflower Murders: A Novel by Anthony Horowitz

Make sure you’re wearing your patience if you plan on reading this clever murder mystery within a murder mystery. But don’t try to solve it as that will only distract from a fun story and good writing. Just let it flow over you and wait for the big, albeit extended, reveal. 

 

The story starts in Crete where retired book publisher Susan Ryland is approached by the owners of a Suffolk hotel, Pauline and Lawrence Trehernes. The Trehernes daughter, Cecily, disappeared shortly after disclosing she discovered, through a book Susan had published, that the wrong man was convicted of a murder committed years ago at the hotel. The Trehernes hire Susan to return to Suffolk to try to find out what happened to their daughter, and who the real murderer is. And thus begins a circuitous, and sometime challenging plot. But the story is good and the characters are colorful, so we hang on for the ride, and a payoff that is finally well delivered. Moonflower Murders is very “Agatha Christie,” which  is a good thing.

 

Freezing Order: A True Story of Russian Money Laundering, State-Sponsored Murder, and Surviving Vladimir Putin's Wrath by Bill Browder

Bill Browder hates Vladimir Putin like American democrats hate Donald Trump. Browder’s first book, Red Notice,which I loved, was about his significant investment ventures into the perestroika-driven privatization of Russian businesses in the 1990’s. The Russian oligarchs who own controlling interest in most Russian businesses didn’t like British or American investors poking their noses into the way they did business, which according to Browder was criminal. They began legally challenging and illegally threatening Browder and his family. Browder’s attorney Sergei Magnitsky, defending the challenges to Browder’s Russian investments, and investigating Russian tax fraud, ended up in a Russian Gulag, and, according to Browder, was beaten to death to cover up the fraud. One result was the 2012 Magnitsky Act, American legislation that allows for travel bans, asset seizures and visa freezes on human rights violators, and has sense been adopted by 30 countries. 

 

Freezing Order continues the story of how Russian oligarchs’ (and other politically-powerful individuals) ill-gotten assets are still sheltered in America, and which, Browder explains is why Putin has spent so much effort to control American politics. Both Red Notice, and now Freezing Order are true-life espionage stories with a contemporary relevance, and I recommend you read both. Oh yes, and both are well-written, which always matters.

 

This Is Going to Hurt: Secret Diaries of a Young Doctor, by Adam Kay

This extremely popular book by a Junior Doctor working in the British National Health Service (socialized medicine), was hilarious and fast-moving, but harshly at the expense of all the patients, nurses and pretty much everyone the author came in contact with during his internship. If you despise the medical establishment, socialized or privatized, you’ll love this book, which picks apart the knowledge and role of doctors, nurses and hospitals, and basically equates it all to a science held together with super glue and bailing wire. 

 

Kay is often quoted saying, “The hours are terrible, the pay is terrible, the conditions are terrible; you’re underappreciated, unsupported, disrespected and frequently physically endangered, “But there’s no better job in the world.” This book certainly provides story after story supporting the first part of that quote. Unfortunately it gives zero stories to support the last part, and sure enough, after a particularly traumatic medical experience (no spoiler here) Kay resigns to become a writer/comedian.

 

This Is Going to Hurt was entertaining, in the sense that we must laugh at horror to keep from crying, but I couldn’t help but (1) feel bad for the people whose misfortune fueled Dr. Kay’s humor, (2) wonder why we should rely on the judgement of doctors living on too little sleep, (3) believe a medical diagnosis gleaned from 30-seconds of googling, and (4) wonder why anyone would want to work in the medical horror-show portrayed by Dr. Kay.  I need to believe more in medical science, not less. Reading This Is Going to Hurt didn’t help. Meh.  

 

Best Books 2019

Of the 38 books I read in 2019, these stand out:

Best Fiction 2019

#1

Daughter of a Daughter of a Queen: A Novel by Sarah Bird

#2

The Mars Room by Rachel Kushner

#3

Where the Crawdads Sing, Delia Owens

Best Non-Fiction 2019

 #1

Leonardo da Vinci by Walter Isaacson

#2

Red Notice: A True Story by Bill Browder

#3

Human Errors: A Panorama of Our Glitches, from Pointless Bones to Broken Genes by Nathan H. Lents

Honor Among Cowboys (Just something I wrote)

"It ain’t natural, all those chickens and no rooster! Besides, the hens will be more content and lay better with a man around," her tall, ruggedly-handsome Texas cowboy announced.

"He stays, end of discussion." Jack turned and headed out the door whipping his blue Jean’s leg with a well-seasoned cowboy hat, sending a puff of dust back to the ranch where it belonged.

This And That

The Continuing Saga – My Husband the Housekeeper
Remember my posts saying that my husband Crouse decided that in his retirement, he would come our housekeeper? And then I posted that the “Thrill was gone,” and that he was slacking off? Well, he was a little hurt at my comment that he wasn’t doing such a great job cleaning, and really is trying harder. Can you believe it! I adore my hubby, and he knows it!

OK, this is precious and priceless. Guess what he said right after I returned from a five-day trip to New Mexico? “Did you notice how clean the house is?” Then he rattled off a list of the cleaning chores he’d done. It was so adorable!

My Kitchen Cabinet
Crouse always says that when work gets slow, we start renovating, and he’s right. Over the holidays we renovated and redecorated our front bathroom – not to worry friends, it’s still full of the nudes I’ve collected over the years – it’s just a little less “bordello,” and a little more “museum!”

Also, when we were camping in Fort Davis over Thanksgiving, my Friend Deb Harrington and I saw some bookshelves, the insides of which were painted bright red, and it look fabulous, so I decided that I wanted to paint the insides of my kitchen cabinets (which are open – no doors) a bright color. So, after my husband came down off the ceiling and warmed to the idea, we went to Home Depot to look at paint samples, and ended up with a completely unexpected choice – stop-sign iridescent orange-yellow.

Also – I’d recently, for what reason I can’t account for, purchased a couple of vintage TV lamps, but couldn’t figure out what to do with them. Well, one thing led to another, and a couple of forays on eBay, and next thing you know we owned a number of TV lamps and they were lighting my kitchen cabinets. AND I LOVE IT!

100 Things I Want To Tell My Children And Grandchildren, #35

Books Can Change Your Life

I’m probably doing something terribly illegal here, but when I saw the article in today’s New York Times, The Book That Changed My Life, I read every single one of the stories and was so glad.  I was also reminded of the book that changed my life, and I knew I wanted “Books Can Change Your Life” to be my #34 of the 100 Things I Want To Tell My Children And Grandchildren. 

The World’s Great Religions was one of those coffee table Time-Life books so popular during the 50’s, the size and heft of a bag of cement and chocked full of colorful pictures. It talked about the ten or so most highly practiced religions of the world, and as a six-year-old I remember thinking, “Where are the Baptists?” I had no idea that come Sunday morning everyone in the world didn’t put on their best garb, grab the covered dish out of the oven, and head over to their Methodist or Baptist Church for Sunday school then church.

But in the book there were dark-skinned women in iridescent saris, cows being worshiped, rooms full of prostrate praying men and no women, cathedrals draped in gold, men with curls instead of sideburns, and statues with many arms and one foot in the air as though dancing. Who were these people? And who were Allah, Buddha and Shiva? 

In addition to attending the Methodist Church in my little home town, when doing sleep-overs with friends I also went to their churches  - Baptist, Church of Christ, Pentecostal, and Christian. Not sure why, but my Catholic buddies were never allowed to bring me along and I really wanted to go. All that getting down on your knees and the pageantry seemed so glamorous and exciting. 

The common thread of all the services I attended was “We’re right, they’re wrong and they’ll go to hell for it, and you’ll go to hell if you’re not good, but even if you’re not good, but you’re sorry, you’ll be OK”. And there seemed to be a conspicuous lack of scientific proof for any of the various beliefs. 

Significantly due to The World’s Great Religions, I grew to believe that if 8-billion people couldn’t agree, it was beyond me to reconcile. So my religion is just this: Be nice and help others when you can.  

What book changed your life?

Click on "Read More" below for “The Book That Changed My Life” from the New York Times. 

Cluster Critiques

The Boys in the Boat: Nine Americans and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics by Daniel James Brown

I cried at the end of this book. Not because it was sad, but rather because I didn’t want the book to end. I’d already purchased it, along with four others, but when my BFF described it as “endearing,” I put down what I was reading at the time and picked up The Boys In The Boat and I am glad  I did.

The Boys in the Boat is about nine young men at the University of Washington who overcame numerous odds to ruin Adolf Hitler’s day by winning the Gold metal in eight-oar rowing at the 1936 Olympics in Berlin. These sons of loggers, shipyard workers and farmers took on and defeated the sons of bankers and senators rowing for elite eastern universities, and those of British aristocrats rowing for Oxford and Cambridge, to stun the Aryan sons of the Nazi state.

“Against the grim backdrop of the Great Depression, they reminded Americans of what can be done when everyone quite literally pulls together. And they provided hope that the ruthless might of the Nazis would not prevail over American grit, determination, and optimism.” - Daniel James Brown (pictured)

Described as “Chariots of Fire, with oars”, and compared to Unbroken and Seabiscuit, I predict that The Boys in the Boat will end 2013 as one of the top five books of the year. 

Not only is the story endearing, I also I found the athleticism of rowing surprising and fascinating. Physiologists calculate that rowing a two-thousand meter race takes the same toll as playing two basketball games back-to-back, in about six minutes. At top speed, the crew are rowing up to 46 stokes per minute – nearly one stroke per second. “It’s not a question of whether you will hurt, or of how much you will hurt; it’s a question of what you will do, and how well you will do it, while pain has her wanton way with you.” - Daniel James Brown 

One of the stories within the story that made me want more was that of George Yeoman Pocock, the British builder of the boat of choice of all the top-rated rowing teams, and whose enchanting quotes began each chapter. For example: “Harmony, balance, rhythm.  There you have it.  That’s what life is all about.” - George Yeoman Pocock 

Read The Boys in the Boat. 

Sisterland by Curtis Sittenfeld

 

I don’t know if Sisterland author Elizabeth Curtis Sittenfeld goes by Curtis because she, like many female writers, felt she would be given more credit as a man, but in any case she is in good company with some other famous gals who adopted male pen names, including Joanne Rowling (J.K. Rowling – Harry Potter), Emily Brontë (Currer Bell - Jane Eyre), Alice Blixen (Isak Dinesen – Out of Africa), Louisa May Alcott (A.M. Barnard – Little Women), and Nelle Harper Lee (Harper Lee - To Kill a Mockingbird).

In Sisterland, Sittenfeld (pictured) gives us identical twin sisters, Daisy and Violet Shramm who have almost nothing in common other than their on-again off-again psychic powers. Vi, the eccentric, milks her “gift” eventually nabbing a spot on the Today Show when it gets out that she has predicted a massive earthquake in the St. Louis area. Daisy, who has changed her name to Kate in an attempt to escape her “psychic” persona, just wants to be a good mother and wife. In fact, it seems they’ve dedicated their lives to being as unlike each other as possible.

In the end, the story of what happens really doesn’t matter because that is not what makes Sisterland worth the read. It is the emotional geography shared by Daisy/Kate and Violet - “sisterland” if you will. Sisters don’t have to be identical twins or psychics to read each other’s minds, and it is this territory in which Sittenfeld soars. The dialogue and dynamics between these sisters rings genuine, and that is what makes the meaningless story of Sisterland meaningful.

Is there an earthquake in St. Louse? Yes, of sorts. Read it if you want to find out, but go into it knowing it’s about sisterhood, not predicting disaster.