Final Five Favorites

Forty-eight more hours and we'll be in a new year, a new decade. My expectations for 2020 are way too high so I'd better guard my heart. One thing that does not cause me trepidation however is knowing full well that we will be gifted with a plethora of grand new novels from our favorite writers and glorious debuts from names that have yet to cross our radar. For all of these, I am deeply grateful.

One novel on my top ten list that didn't seem to get the buzz I thought it deserved was "Find Me," Andre Aciman's follow up to the luminous "Call Me By Your Name." If you haven't read the first book then, I can't believe I'm

suggesting this, see the movie. It's worth it for the Italian scenery alone. Afterwards you can fall into the most romantic novel I read this year. Here's what I had to say in "Library Journal."

Love in all its sublime iterations is at the heart of Aciman's incandescent sequel to the acclaimed Call Me by Your Name. It's been ten years since the heartbreaking end to the passionate summertime affair between 17-year-old piano prodigy Elio and his father's protégé, Oliver, an American graduate student living with them in Italy. Now Elio resides in Rome, visited frequently by his father, Samuel. The two languidly walk the streets, revisiting places that have been meaningful to each and eventually sharing these vigils with new lovers. In sensuous prose, Aciman creates honest relationships unfettered by age, gender, or time, perfectly capturing that initial hesitancy one experiences when embarking upon an intimate liaison. The joy and mystery of music, so wondrously described that you can hear it, features prominently in the story when Elio bonds with Michel, whom he meets at a chamber concert in Paris. Though Elio and Michel care deeply for each other, readers will wonder if Elio can ever forget his first love and whether Oliver, a married professor with two children, will ever find his way back to Elio.

And then there's the poet Ocean Vuong whose debut novel with the striking title, "On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous," brought me to my knees. https://bit.ly/2QbD9CM

Australian journalist Trent Dalton created Eli Bell, the most delightful twelve-year-old narrator I've ever spent time with. "Boy Swallows Universe" is unlike

any novel I've ever read so you can imagine how shocked I was to discover that this sprawling saga of familial chaos, organized crime, magical happenings, violence, and tenderness reflects Dalton's own coming-of-age experience. Yes, this book landed on "Library Journal's" top ten literary fiction books of the year. I didn't have to sell it. We all agreed.

I've been reading Alice Hoffman for at least thirty years but she became inordinately special to me several years ago when she attended the Southwest

Florida Reading Festival http://readfest.org/ to accept an award, not just for the depth and breadth of her writing, but for her work advocating for breast cancer survivors. "The World That We Knew" stood out for me this year as one of her very best. https://bit.ly/2SHvgXx

Note to my local readers! William Kent Krueger will be speaking at this year's reading festival on Saturday, March 7th. See the link above. He'll be discussing "This Tender Land," my final pick for 2019's top ten list. A writer of such warmth and heart, Krueger finds redemption in even the most despicable characters. His writing is a marvel of eloquence couched in simplicity. https://bit.ly/2F6QIgB

That's it folks. I could add ten more to the list but who would read through all that. Here's to a glorious new year, healthy, peaceful, and full of a lot more love. Happy reading to all and please comment, comment, comment. I really want to know what you're enjoying. 2020, here we come!

Favorite Reads of 2019

Here we are at the end of another year, another decade in fact, and I'm still sharing my reading habits with you. When I'm feeling more sentimental I should probably go back over the last fifteen or twenty years to revisit my choices, see which books have stood the test of time for me and which ones were just fly by night. When I write for "Library Journal" I am reviewing for book buyers around the country and my criteria for what should be purchased often differs from my criteria for a favorite. This list reflects the top ten titles, out of the over one hundred books that I spent time with this year, that truly spoke to me, to my heart and to my gut. The first five, in no particular order are:

"The Disappearing Earth" by Julia Phillips. Here's what I had to say about this one which met all the criteria for me. It also landed on several other "best of"

lists this year. 

In her dazzlingly original debut novel, Phillips imagines a cold, desolate climate inhabited by characters who exude warmth and strength. This cinematic setting is the far eastern Russian peninsula, Kamchatka, where white Russians and indigenous tribes uneasily coexist. In the chilling opening chapter, two sisters vanish after a day at the beach, and though a witness describes seeing them with a man in a shiny black car, the authorities come up empty. Three years earlier in a village many hours further north, a Native girl also disappears, but she is dismissed as a runaway. Phillips cleverly weaves these two incidents through subsequent chapters that cover a year in the lives of her many vividly drawn characters, illustrating the subtle effects of racism on the investigation. Themes of dark and light pervade the narrative. Outsiders, those with darker skin or hair, are blamed for an uptick in crime. Prejudice blinds people to the truth until two grieving mothers, brought together by a photographer with a penchant for nosing into other people's business, manage to see past their differences to their shared loss and courage. 

"Where the Crawdads Sing" by Delia Owens. I fought reading this novel for

way too long for my own foolish reasons. Here's what I wrote about why it ultimately captivated me.

Delia Owens is a renowned naturalist and her knowledge of the environment informs every page of this lush, lyrical novel. Set in the marshes of the North Carolina coast, (which smelled and felt much like the mangrove swamps of southwest Florida), this is an exploration of extreme loneliness and disconnection. Owens gives readers something that's so hard to find any more - an original story, a novel that you simply can't put down. Combining poetry, mystery, character analysis, and enduring love amid horrifying abuse.





"Save Me the Plums" by Ruth Reichl. http://readaroundtheworld-sallyb.blogspot.com/2019/03/recalling-how-much-i-love-food-memoirs.html

"The Old Drift" by Namwali Serpell is a large, luscious, multi-generational, historical novel. This is a remarkable debut, one of those books that you can revel in, lost within the language, the characters, and never want to put down.

Set in Rhodesia at the time of those infamous explorers, Stanley and

Livingstone, the story is based upon the building of the first railroad over the great Zambezi River at Victoria Falls but the narrative ranges from the late 1800's to 2024. http://readaroundtheworld-sallyb.blogspot.com/2019/04/the-old-drift.html

And then the novel that helped me recuperate from surgery when I was feeling overwhelmed and vulnerable. Julie Orringer's "The Flight Portfolio," set in and around Marseilles, France, throughout 1940 and 1941, as the Nazis invade and install the pro-Fascist Vichy government. http://readaroundtheworld-sallyb.blogspot.com/2019/06/flight-portfolio-soars.html

My final five best for the year will be coming in a day or two. Stay tuned!

Leonard Pitts, Jr.

I first became acquainted with the passionate social commentary of Leonard Pitts, Jr. (http://www.leonardpittsjr.com/about.html)when his Pulitzer Prize-winning column was syndicated in my local Ft. Myers newspaper. I followed him for years, at least until I dropped my subscription after "The News-Press" sold its soul to "USA Today." When I heard that Pitts was turning his talents to fiction I was thrilled but found the first novel I read, "Freeman," less than thrilling. I'm happy to report that his latest effort, "The Last Thing You Surrender," is a stellar work of historical fiction.

"He was dreaming of home when the explosion came." From the very first line Pitts lets readers know that this will be an explosive book. Marine private George Simon is thrown from his bunk in the ship docked at Pearl Harbor, and as the water rushes in and he tries to navigate with a broken hip, we learn everything we need to know about George Simon while he ruminates for several pages on the likelihood of death. 

And then a vision appears, a "hulking colored guy" who George recognizes from the mess hall where the black soldiers cook and serve food to the enlisted men. As Gordy hauls George up onto his back, eventually carrying them both to safety, we intuit that the lives of these two men, one white and one black,  hailing from very different sections of Mobile, Alabama, will be forever intertwined.

An incredible amount of research went into the writing of this novel even as Pitts mines the experiences of his own father, a corporal in the United States Army during World War II. To readers my age it's no secret that the armed forces were still segregated in the 1940's and that black troops were despicably treated. I guess I assume that everyone is knowledgeable about the famed Tuskegee Airmen. Eleanor Roosevelt flew with one of the black pilots to bring about awareness of their heroic feats. But, have you heard of the Black Panthers? http://www.761st.com/18update/2018a/ I certainly had not. Another shortcoming in my education!

Pitts brings alive the struggles of the 761st tank battalion to be respected and commissioned to battle through the complex character of Luther Hayes, whose visceral hatred of the United States, its military, and the white men who run it, stems from the unspeakable trauma of having witnessed the lynching of his parents when he was only nine years old. Through a strange quirk of fate Luther's redemption from life as an imprisoned alcoholic will come through the intervention of his sister Thelma and George's father, Atty. John Simon.

I simply could not put this book down. It is wrenchingly violent and realistically tragic, in that horrific things do happen to good people. Man's inhumanity to man is seen not just in the Japanese prisoner of war camps but right here in the shipyards of Mobile where black workers were ostracized and abused. George Simon will lose his faith in God even as Thelma Hayes will make a momentously faith-inspired decision. You will be appalled at the evil Pitts reveals even as you may sob at the acts of love and redemption. 

At a time when so many younger writers seem to lean in to gimmicky means of grabbing a reader's attention or priding themselves on deliberately obtuse prose to be waded through rather than enjoyed, Leonard Pitts, Jr. has created a straight forward, honest story steeped in the accurate history of a flawed country yearning, I have to believe, to be better. 

This is How it Always Is

I'm not sure if it's the kind of novels that I read for Library Journal, the current state of our politics, or a combination of both, but I realized how jaded I've become when, a quarter of the way through this lovely, uplifting novel, I told my friend Don that it wasn't believable to me. The family is just too wonderful. How sad is that?

Laurie Frankel's "This Is How it Always Is" ventures into territory that's apparently unfamiliar to many people based upon the reactions of our library's book group which met earlier today to discuss it. As I mentioned in my last post regarding "Frankissstein," gender dysphoria, gender fluidity, or questions of sexual identity fascinate me. My own step-family spent years helping a daughter transition to a man. It is hard work but with love and encouragement it can result in celebration. 

Rosie, an ER physician, and Penn, a stay at home dad and budding novelist, have an enviable marriage. They are friends, they talk to and fully support each other and their family of five boys. Rosie always wanted at least one girl, so when her toddler, Claude, shows a preference for tutus and fairy wings over balls and bats, she feels no need to worry. But when Claude comes down the stairs dressed for his first day of school in, well, a dress, Penn and Rosie realize that they may have been naïve about the hurdles they are about to face.

There is so much to learn here and Frankel, who is mom to a transgender child herself, does an exquisite job of teaching readers without being pedantic. She doesn't shy away from the fact that parenting a child who feels that he or she is in the wrong skin affects the entire family. Siblings may be supportive to a point but communication is key and secrets will ultimately be destructive. 

After a terrifying confrontation with an armed bigot, Rosie and Penn make the difficult decision to relocate to Seattle where they believe they can start fresh, where Claude, now a girl named Poppy, can be accepted for who she is. The move and the subterfuge take a terrific toll on the boys, especially Roo, who was a standout student, athlete, and leader at his previous school. His reaction forces readers to question just how much the needs of one sibling should supercede the needs of the family unit as a whole. It's a legitimate question and made for some interesting discussion, with some of us believing it was unfair and others remarking that families often make long term decisions based upon the needs of one member over the needs of another.

Then, in a diversionary chapter I did not see coming, Rosie agrees to her firm's insistence that she participate in their outreach program in Thailand. Poppy, doubting her own future as a girl, travels with her mom to the remote medical outpost where she is charged with teaching English to the little ones. In this land of the Buddha, sexual identity is unquestioned and Poppy is finally able to see a way forward. 

I enjoyed this novel for so many reasons. It made my heart expand with love for this flawed but devoted family. It reminded me of the phenomenal variations of humanity, of the enormous capacity we have to not just "accept" or worse, "tolerate" differences but to embrace the entire spectrum of creation. If you are feeling jaded by the world we inhabit and are in need of a jolt of the possible then this is a book I can absolutely recommend. 

And a Note About Frankissstein

When Jeanette Winterson's latest novel, "Frankissstein," showed up in my mailbox I'll admit that I relegated it to the bottom of my huge reading pile doubting it would ever make it to the top ten. Lesson learned! Never judge a

book by its cover. This was one of the best surprise reads of the year - laugh out loud funny and deeply provocative. Winterson probably gave me more food for thought than any other author I read this year.

We hear the term "gender fluid" bandied about a lot lately but have we ever really pondered the ramifications of its meaning? In "Frankissstein" Winterson imagines a moment in time in the lives of Mary and Percy Bysshe Shelley and their friend Lord Byron as they drink away the long, dark, damp hours of a sojourn on Lake Geneva back in 1816. On a dare, Mary writes her now famous book "Frankenstein," but Winterson draws our attention to the sexist attitudes toward female writers and women in general, focusing on Mary's single motherhood and poverty after the death of her husband.

Fast forward to current/future times where a transgender scientist, Ry Shelley  falls in love with Dr. Victor Stein, an expert in artificial intelligence who's experimenting with cryogenics. Their affair engenders a fascinating exploration of sexual attraction, why we are drawn to certain people, and why it is often the mind of the love object that hypnotizes rather than just the shell. And if we are just shells, why then shouldn't our souls, our essence, be uploaded to databases for future use?

For comic relief we have Ron Lord, creator of a lucrative line of sex-bots, who becomes enamoured of a certain evangelical writer with friends in high places. She sees in Ron's creations a means to God's end - no more need for adultery, no more sexually transmitted disease. Think about it! Is it really cheating if you're with a bot?

Winterson has written, as I said for LJ, a brave, bawdy book, outrageously original yet sentimental too. If you've ever questioned the nature of desire, the complexity of relationships, or the fragile boundary between male and female sensibility, then take a chance on "Frankissstein." You won't be disappointed.