Croatia: Girl at War

Girl at War

by Sara Novic

 

 

In 2013, I went on a European cruise with my mother and my daughter, who was then 15 years old.  It was truly an amazing journey ... we flew into Venice, stayed two days, then boarded the cruise ship and sailed to Dubrovnik, Croatia; Izmir, Turkey; Athens, Greece; and back around to Split, Croatia before returning to Venice.  Every stop was magical, but Croatia in particular touched my heart and my imagination, and ever since, I've wanted to learn more.  We spent the day in Dubrovnik with a local tour guide who knew his country's history backwards and forwards and took care to share with us not only the history of Croatia, but also its recent political upheavals.  Most important to me were the stories he told about the people of Croatia and how things we only see on television or read about briefly in our American newspapers impacted real human beings.  His telling made history and current events and media headlines stark and brutal and shockingly real, and he reminded me of how shamefully easy it is to sit in my comfortable life and forget about the world's pain and suffering. 

 

Since then, I have wanted to learn more about the civil war that led to Croatia's birth and the genocide that sadly got so little attention.  As always, I searched for a fictionalized version of those events to help it resonate in ways that nonfiction simply cannot.  Girl at War, by Sara Novic, did exactly that.  The novel does not read like historical fiction.  Rather, the details of the war are largely background and instead, Novic depicts for us the impact those events had on a young girl, her family, her country, and her sense of identity and belonging in a world that so horrifically let her down.

 

The story opens in 1991 near Zagreb, which is now Croatia's capital, and Ana is 10 years old, blissfully ignorant of the danger that surrounds her and her community.  She loves her parents, her baby sister Rahela, her best friend, school, and all of the simple routines that make being 10 a wonderful time in life.  The first couple of chapters depict this simplicity and show perfectly how a child accepts their surroundings, often without questioning or recognizing that something isn't as it should be.  Ana asks her father questions about the air raid drills and food shortages, but she readily accepts his somewhat evasive answers even while understanding that he was protecting her by offering only portions of the truth.  As I read this opening to the novel, I wondered if I had picked up a Young Adult story, but the mood and tone changed swiftly as baby Rahela's serious illness and Croatia's political environment careen out of control and push Ana head-on into the reality of the adult world.  In a whirlwind of denial and bad luck, Ana's family finds themselves in the wrong place at the wrong time, with a devastating outcome that follows Ana the rest of her life.

 

Fast forward ten years to Ana in America, attending college in New York, in love and with a bright future ahead of her, except that she cannot process what happened to her or figure out how to move forward.  Ana has not lost everything, but the price of what she did lose is her sense of self and well-being, her ability to feel at home in her skin and to make sense of the world.  She decides to return to Croatia and confront her past so that she may find a way to let it go and finally move forward. 

 

It's difficult to tell much more of this story without spoiling it for those who may wish to read it, so I will stop here with the plot summary.  Much of the novel explores how trauma impacts human thought, feeling, interpersonal relationships, and all that actually makes us human.  Ana's journey is to return not only to Croatia, but also to herself. 

 

 

 



Sweden: A Man Called Ove

A Man Called Ove

by Fredrik Backman

 

Sweden

This novel gets the prize for the most charming, engaging, heart-tugging book I've read in a really long time.  Ove is a 60-year old curmudgeon, whose external demeanor is rigid, direct, intolerant, grumpy, and off-putting.  But as the narrative moves along, we quickly see that underneath his gruff exterior, Ove has a heart of gold; he just doesn't want anyone to know it.  As we get to know Ove through stories of his childhood and his relationships with others, we come to know him as a man who is honorable, loyal, kind, and deeply committed to doing the right thing.  Each chapter shows us these traits through stories about Ove's beloved wife Sonja, the start of his career with the railroads, the elderly couple down the street with whom he has a love-hate relationship, new neighbors (a clumsy man, feisty Iranian wife, and two precocious little girls), a couple of adolescent boys in need to support, and the stubborn street cat who adopts Ove as his own.  With each vignette, we see Ove's journey from hopelessness (can't say why ... have to read it yourself) to learning how to live again.

This is probably my favorite book of all that I've read this year.  From my Goodreads page:

This book has it all ... humor, wisdom, charm, poignancy, incredible character development, interesting structure, serious themes about aging and community and friendship and love, and pretty much anything else you'd want a novel to be. I laughed out loud in several places, fell completely in love with curmudgeonly Ove, came to know the characters as if they were personal friends (including Ove's deceased wife and stubborn cat), and felt heartbroken when I reached the last page.

Booklist had this to say about "A Man Called Ove" ... Readers seeking feel-good tales with a message will rave about the rantings of this solitary old man with a singular outlook. If there was an award for ''Most Charming Book of the Year,'' this first novel by a Swedish blogger-turned-overnight-sensation would win hands down.

I could not agree more.

 

 

England: Everyone Brave is Forgiven AND Little Bee

Everyone Brave is Forgiven

by Chris Cleave

 

England

 

 

 

Set in World War II London, this love story tells the tale of three young people trying to make their mark in a world that is dark and full of pain.  Mary is naïve and idealistic, but good-hearted and determined to shun her wealthy upbringing in favor of finding a way to make a difference in the world.  She volunteers to help in the war effort, but her dreams of playing a dramatic role as a spy or something similar are dashed when she is assigned to teach at a local school in place of a young male teacher who is now a soldier.  She travels with her young charges to the English countryside, part of the British elite's effort to protect their children from the risk of bombing in London, but she soon returns after witnessing the discrimination and abuse of children of color.  Fiercely determined to make her mark, Mary creates her own school in London and begins to teach the children who were left behind or treated so poorly that their parents brought them home.

 

There, she meets Tom, a school administrator, and they fall in love ... sort of.  Mary seems to be going through the motions, as if she believes she ought to be in love with Tom but isn't quite sure she really is.  Tom is a good man who had intentionally avoided enlisting in the military, and he is very distraught about his best friend Alistair's choice to volunteer as a soldier.  When Mary and Alistair meet, they are inexplicably drawn to each other and resist their feelings frantically ... to no avail.  The love triangle ends tragically, as one would expect in a story about love during wartime.

I enjoyed Everyone Brave is Forgiven, but not nearly as much as the author's other book ...

Little Bee

by Chris Cleave

 

Nigeria and England

Little Bee is the name of a young Nigerian girl who flees the violence in her country and arrives as a refugee in England, where she seeks and finds the young British couple with whom she had a chance and tragic encounter on the shore of her country a few years before.  The novel is told in Little Bee's strong and inspirational voice.  She tells us of her childhood and the constant fear that she and her sister lived with while growing up in a remote village, always under threat of an impending attack.  She tells us of the wealthy, somewhat self-absorbed journalists who come to Nigeria for a vacation, find themselves confronted with a violent example of Little Bee's daily life, and arrogantly believe they can influence the outcome, with horrific, life-altering consequences for all of them.

When they go their separate ways, they leave the Nigerian beach with the assumption they will never see each other again.  But Little Bee finds herself in a refugee holding cell in England and after escaping, makes her way to their home to ask for help.  The implications are enormous and powerful. 

This is a novel that you just have to read for yourself.  Even the Amazon description says, "We don't want to tell you too much about this book. It is a truly special story and we don't want to spoil it. ... The story starts [on an Africa beach], but the book doesn't. And it's what happens afterward that is most important. Once you have read it, you'll want to tell everyone about it. When you do, please don't tell them what happens either. The magic is in how it unfolds."

Ethiopia: Sweetness in the Belly

Sweetness in the Belly

by Camilla Gibb

Ethiopia

It's been a really long time since I've imposed my thoughts on whomever is actually reading this blog.  That does not mean, of course, that I haven't been reading though I admit my pace has slowed considerably in the past few months.  I've been distracted by life.  Our household is about to undergo a major transition as we send our youngest off to college.  I've been on quite a roller coaster ride about this, some days feeling sad and mopey, other days read for the next phase of my life's adventure, and still others just stunned that we've arrived here so quickly.  My girl is so ready for this, and honestly, I've been parenting now for more than 24 years.  And I'm tired.  And ready to focus on myself a little bit.  So while I will miss her, just as I missed my sons when they left home, I'm also looking forward to sitting back a little to watch her fly and to think about what's next for my life.  You can count on more books, and hopefully more blogging, being part of that equation.

I've heard from a few people that my posts have been missed.  I've always said that I write this for myself, but it's been nice to know that others may be deriving some enjoyment out of following along.  So let's get caught up.  I've read 16 books since I last wrote.  Five of the 16 were set in countries outside the United States.  You can follow all of my reading on Goodreads, if that interests you.  I think I actually miss reading the world in alphabetical order, and I may return to that.  If only I could find a good novel set in Bhutan.  I'm really stuck with that one.  Anyone have recommendations?

I read Sweetness in the Belly for my book club and found it to be incredibly timely.  With all that is going on in the world, and in our country, with respect to how we view and treat immigrants, especially those who are of the Islamic faith, this story of an orphaned British girl who grows up in a Muslim shrine in Morocco is very compelling for our time.  We meet Lilly at the end of her adolescence, as she is on a pilgrimage from Morocco to Ethiopia, a predominantly Christian country where tensions with the Muslim community are brewing and bubbling over.  In Ethiopia, Lilly immerses herself in the religion and culture of her faith, but she is white in a country of dark-skinned people, Muslim in a country of Christians, and orphaned in a country that prizes family above all else.  She cannot escape her personal story and is thus caught between cultures and identities, not sure where she fits in, if anywhere at all.

The novel is told in Lilly's own voice from a retrospective vantage point, many years after she left Ethiopia in 1974 to escape Haile Selassi's reign.  Dipping back in time, we experience Lilly's immersion into the holy city of Harar, the way of life of the women who cobble together their livelihood with whatever is available to them, her exposure to those rebelling against the political tides, and her all-encompassing, passionate affair with one of those rebels, a well-educated doctor with whom she knows she can never make a life.  After leaving Ethiopia, she returns to her "home" of England and again faces the dilemma of not feeling that she truly belongs. 

In London, she looks the part but does not feel connected to the world that threatens to subsume her.  In an effort to preserve her religion and the culture to which she feels she belongs, she befriends an Ethiopian immigrant, Amina, and together, they raise Amina's children and search exhaustively for the men they left behind in Ethiopia when they came to England as refugees.  Ultimately, Lilly recognizes that she must decide whether and how to let go of her assumptions and expectations for her life without abandoning the parts of herself most important to her identity.  Lilly's story is an incredible depiction of what it must be like to be a stranger in a strange land, to believe you know who you are but not to be accepted on your own terms, and to face the unimaginable choice of what parts of yourself to compromise.

This was a beautiful, poignant, and thought-provoking novel. 

 



Canada: Good to a Fault

Good to a Fault

by Marina Endicott

Set in Saskatoon, Canada, this is a novel of trying to do the right thing and not knowing where to draw the line.  Good to a Fault is a sweet story with endearing characters you find yourself cheering for ... even the ones you don't like very much.  Clara is our protagonist.  She's middle aged, unmarried and childless, dissatisfied but mostly accepting of her job at an insurance company, and mulling over the universal questions of what she wants for her future, how so much time has already passed her by, and what mistakes she wishes she could do over again.  I pictured her as eager and a little bit frumpy, prone to spending too much time on the question of her place in the universe, but ultimately likeable and someone you'd want to hug.

Enter the Gage family.  Clara, distracted with her musings while driving, hits their car, which doubles as their home.  The mother, Lorraine, goes to the hospital where she is treated for very minor scrapes and also ... diagnosed with cancer.  Clay, the floundering and unreliable father of the family, takes off, leaving Lorraine and the kids to fend for themselves in a hospital in a strange city with no resources.  Horrified and determined to help, Clara invites Lorraine's three children and their curmudgeonly grandmother to stay in her home while Lorraine is treated and tries to recover.

As Clara, on the fly, learns the ins and outs of raising children and putting their needs ahead of her own while also running back and forth to the hospital to support Lorraine and working around Grandma's self-centered nastiness, she grapples with another set of existential questions.  What does it mean to be "good" and how much do we owe those we have wronged?  While she's sorting this out, she (and we, along with her) falls in love with Dolly, Trevor, and baby Pearce, the children who have weathered poverty, homelessness, their father's alcoholism, their mother's uncertainty ... and whose spirits still shine like little reminders of hope and love in the darkest of circumstances.  She falls in love with the steadfast Episcopal priest Paul, too, and begins to imagine themselves as a little family.  Then Lorraine gets better.  Which is a good thing.  Right?

I confess that I saw a little bit of myself in Clara, which always makes the reading experience resonate.  I'm not unmarried or childless, but I am middle aged and occasionally frumpy.  And I do tend to get myself spun up about those meaning-of-life kinds of questions that leave me wondering if I'm doing all I'm meant to do with, in the words of poet Mary Oliver, my "one wild and precious life."  And in the spirit of full disclosure, I do lean a little bit too far forward at times in my efforts to be helpful.  Fortunately, I've never moved a homeless family of strangers into my home or completely remodeled my house to make it more comfortable for them, as Clara does.  And I guess I've never felt like I was obligated to do good, just that I would really like to.  I have definitely experienced feeling unappreciated or unwanted in my effort to help, and while that stings in the moment, it usually serves as a good reminder of boundaries and the limitations we have on our ability to influence another person.

Clara's story doesn't end the way she envisioned it might, but it ends as well as can be expected given the circumstances, the personalities, and the weaknesses of the human condition.  That's another good reminder ... that we don't have a crystal ball to show us the future or the outcome of our actions.  Our desire to do the right thing and the leaps of faith we often take to execute that desire ... they have to be enough to sustain us.

Greece: Three Junes

Three Junes

by Julia Glass

Don't you hate it when you don't enjoy a book that everyone else loves?  When this happens, I wonder a little bit what might be wrong with me.  Or what I must be missing.  Or the flip side of the coin ... what's wrong with or being missed by everybody else?  So when I got halfway through Julia Glass's prize-winning novel, Three Junes, and realized I was skimming a lot of pages, I forced myself to slow down, regroup, and try again with a more positive attitude.  I actually did a little research, trying to figure out what the appeal of this novel was for others, and the context helped a lot, kind of like it did when I read my book set in Algeria. 

Set in Scotland, Greece, and New York City, the story follows the McLeod family:  parents Paul and Maureen, and their three grown son, Fenno, David and Dennis.  The structure of the novel is a triptych, written in three parts that are related and function as one piece, but not necessarily intended to be viewed as a whole.  Glass could have written three separate books, a trilogy instead of a triptych, but she might have lost the thread of the important themes of life, death, grief, and connection.

In the first section, our narrator is Paul.  He is traveling in Greece, just after Maureen's death, and he becomes enchanted with Fern, a young American woman in his tour group, who propels him to think retrospectively about his marriage and, as the book jacket references, its "secret sorrows."  We come to know Paul as a quiet, steady, introspective, and somewhat naïve character, and we love him because of those traits.  His gentleness is in sharp contrast to Maureen's fierceness, epitomized in a poignant scene where he embraces her from behind while her hands are submerged in water ... he does not realize that she is drowning two newborn puppies and is stunned but accepting when he realizes what she is doing.  He is like the proverbial deer in headlights throughout this part of the novel: uncomfortable but not confrontational about Fenno's sexuality, hurt but not hostile about Maureen's close relationship with a male friend, attracted but distant from the lovely and intriguing Fern.  I wanted to hug him and tell him that everything will be okay.

Part two is Fenno's story of leaving his homeland of Scotland, bound for New York City where he emerges with confidence as a gay man and establishes himself as distinctly and differently from Paul as he can.  We meet Mal, his friend who ultimately dies of AIDS but not without blistering anger and resentment at his fate.  And his mentor, who plays both paternal and fraternal roles in Fenno's life, helping him to open a bookstore and put down roots in his adopted home.  And Tony, the photographer, who connects us to the third section, which is Fetn's story.  Yes, we meet her again, this time pregnant and a little lost.  She and Fenno find themselves with crossed paths, but they never realize their most intimate connection: Paul.  

By the time I got to Fern, I was really limping along.  Despite my research and my determination to finish the darn book.  I can't really say I got much out of Fern's story.  Or the entire novel.  But I can say I tried.

France: The Nightingale

The Nightingale

by Kristin Hannah

Seems like everyone I know has read this one, and I guess that makes sense since it's been on the NY Times bestseller list for 53 weeks.  The story is richly compelling, one you won't want to put down until you've reached the conclusion.  I love those kinds of novels.  They make me stay up too late at night, walk around the house with the book in my hand, and put off daily chores in favor of squeezing in a few pages at any opportunity. 

Set in France during World War II, this is the story of the French experience of the Holocaust, told from the perspective of two sisters who react to the German occupation very differently but who ultimately find they have more in common than they ever believed possible.  Vianne, the elder sister, is happily married with one child, Sophie, when the war arrives in France and changes everything, beginning with her husband Antoine's departure for the front.  Alone and unsure, she bravely rises to the occasion, coping with the German officers who billet in her home, the loss of her best friend to a concentration camp, and the extreme poverty and hunger that all are facing.  Her younger sister, Isabelle, was always a rebel in youth and continues to be so as she refuses to accept the German occupation of her beloved France and joins the resistance, taking on increasingly dangerous missions to try to save her country and as many human beings as she can along the way.  Their relationship is strained because of childhood trauma - the death of their beloved mother and their father's resulting neglect and absence from their lives.  But as the story unfolds, they realize their beliefs about each other are utterly wrong.  There are more ways than one to be brave and righteous in the face of horror.

I've previously resisted reading Kristin Hannah's novels because I perceived them to be in the chick-lit category, which I have not been very interested in reading.  Holocaust themes, however, generally defy the non-substantive subject matter that I judge chick-lit to embody.  I remember once in grad school, we read Maus I and Maus II, by Art Spiegelman.  These are graphic biographical novels that tell the story of Spiegelman's journey to understand his father's history as a Holocaust survivor and to make sense of their relationship.  The discussions we had in class about these books were complex and heavy ... and ultimately, unanswerable.  How can the Holocaust be conveyed with both accuracy and integrity in any form of art?  Is it appropriate to do so?  Who has the right to do so?  What is our responsibility, as readers, for receiving a biographical account of someone's Holocaust experience?  Does that change if the account is fictional? 

I am drawn to novels about this unthinkable part of human history that took place less than a century ago.  And I've thought a lot about why.  Because it feels really strange to "enjoy" something about a dark stain on humanity.  It's like when my daughter and I visited the Holocaust Museum in Washington, DC last year and afterwards, someone asked us, "Did you have fun?"  Um, ... no.  "Fun" is not the adjective to use for the Holocaust Museum, and neither is "enjoy."  We were so somber, so introspective, so humbled as we walked through the exhibits, we did not speak.  After a short time, we went in separate directions, silently agreeing that we needed to bear witness in our own private ways.

And that's what I think Holocaust fiction does.  It forces us to bear witness.  To look with eyes that can't be shut, to remember, hold space for the victims, and respect the survivors and their descendants who live with the weight of this history.

Brazil: Snow Hunters

Snow Hunters

by Paul Yoon

I like the idea of this book more than the book itself.  The themes of immigration and learning how to thrive in a new land and culture are among my favorites, but alas, this book is not.  The main character, Yohan, is a quiet, contemplative refugee who we meet as he arrives in Brazil after two years in a Japanese prison camp.  We don't know why he decided not to return home to Korea after being released from prison at the end of the war.  We get very little insight about his former life in Korea, but there are glimpses of his reminiscence of the camp, where he cared for his friend Peng after he was blinded in battle.  We know he has been traumatized in a way the keeps him from truly connecting to those he comes to know in Brazil.  The story, which has little dialogue and much exploration of Yohan's inner thoughts and feelings, spans ten years without much of anything happening.  I agree with other reviews that note the poetry of the narrative, but the book did not speak to my heart.

P.S. I do think Snow Hunters should get a prize for most beautiful, mesmerizing covers.  I just love the feelings it evokes.

And yes, for those of you who are following closely enough, I have suddenly gone out of order.  Gasp!  So here's what happened ...

About two weeks ago, I experienced a miserable night of insomnia.  You know, those never-ending hours of darkness where you find yourself tossing, turning, kicking off the sheets, yanking them back on, reaching ridiculous levels of frustration over any little sound in the night ... not that you were going to be sleeping anyway.  My mind was racing with my growing list of things to do, and suddenly, I realized I was feeling exactly the same way I used to feel before moving away from the chaos of the Washington DC area.  I had one of those lightbulb moments, suddenly understanding that after a long and lovely break from stress, which I'd credited to my lovely new hometown in the Shenandoah Valley, I'd somehow managed to allow the craziness back into my life.  And I was suffering the consequences of forgetting to be mindful about how I spend my days. 

I got up at about 3:00 a.m. and made a list of all the things I had committed to and all the things that were worrying, stressing, or overwhelming me.  And then I made some changes.  I communicated with some very wonderful, supporting, understanding people whose help I needed to set better boundaries or back out of things I really wanted to do but just couldn't follow through on.  (They were all amazing about it, by the way ... note to self: keep surrounding yourself with people like this while also being more careful about making promises you can't keep.)  Over the next week, I focused on getting things ... er, mainly myself ... back under control, and I'm happy to say that the process itself cured my insomnia and the impact of the process has significantly reduced my stress.

On the chopping block, unfortunately, was this blog.  I was going to retire it without even getting very far into my own self-assigned challenge.  Reading is probably the most important gift I give myself.  It's my escape, my relaxation, my form of meditation, my chance to learn and grow.  It's something I share with people I love ... my mother, sister, mother-in-law, closest friends, favorite colleagues, and sometimes my children although they don't read as much as I wish they did.  It's a huge part of my identity.  And the blog, while fun and interesting and challenging, has detracted from the overall power that reading has to positively influence my days.  Too much worry about picking the right book, finding one that I even want to bother with reading, and feeling frustrated when the one selected turns out to be disappointing.  I suffered over Bhutan ... found plenty, just didn't really want to read them right now, or maybe ever.  So I was ready to throw in the towel and skip the entire blog instead of only Bhutan.

But then I read this book set in Brazil anyway.  It was freely chosen, for myself, and not for the blog, and I wanted to write about it.  So I'm switching things up.  Changing my own rules.  I'll keep blogging since I'm really doing this for myself anyway.  I mean, I do hope that anyone who is reading this actually enjoys it, but I know there aren't too many people clicking on the link to these pages and that's okay.  This is about my journey, so I'm kicking back just a little and plan to keep working my way around the world but in the order in which I feel inspired.  I've said before that often times, books choose me.  I can't, and frankly don't want to force myself to pick up a book that's not calling my name. 

So today ... Brazil, and tomorrow ... I'm not sure.  That's part of what I find joyful about reading ... you just never know where it will take you.

Benin: Say You're One of Them

Say You're One of Them

by Uwem Akpan

Benin was really challenging.  A tiny country in West Africa, Benin has not produced many writers whose works have been translated into English, nor has it apparently inspired many to write stories set in its landscape.  Ann Morgan, whose blog "A Year of Reading the World" has provided much inspiration and useful suggestions for me, made the same realization when she struggled to find a book for Benin.  Like Morgan, I picked up a number of books that actually turned out to be set in Benin City, Nigeria rather than the country of Benin.  I finally settled on Uwem Akpan's short story collection, Say You're One of Them.  Only one of the stories was actually set in Benin, but all took place somewhere in West Africa.  I was reluctant to make this one count, but I suppose it's no different than choosing a book for Belize where it's mostly set in California.

I want so badly to like short stories, but I just don't.  I feel there just isn't enough time to get to know any of the characters or to develop plot lines deeply enough.  It's kind of like small talk at a party.  Not very satisfying, at least not to me.  I do appreciate the art form, and I recognize that short stories are probably extremely difficult to write well because of the condensed space in which the writer has to do his or her work.  But I'd rather not read them most of the time. 

These stories though are richly compelling.  Uwem wrote them specifically to call attention to what is happening to children every day across the continent of Africa.  They are the stories of children who are suffering, children who have to grow up too fast, to earn income for their families, to make decision no one should ever have to make, to sell their bodies or be sold, to witness death and abuse and cruelty.  There is a lot of pain in these pages.  These stories take readers to a reality that is rather unbelievable if only we could be so naïve as to pretend we didn't know the truth of what exists out there in the world beyond our comfortable homes and privileged lives.  We are forced, through reading this collection, to look, hold our eyes wide open, and resist the urge to deny their truth.  And that makes them good in a difficult sort of way.

Belize: Wildwood

Wildwood

by Drusilla Campbell

I’m writing this from an airplane, hurtling across the sky towards the Rocky Mountains of Colorado, where I will escape from the daily grind, the sameness of my days, the gray and rainy weather, and a recently acquired routine of spending too many hours at my desk.  With my husband and daughter, I’m planning a few days of something different and expect to return somewhat rejuvenated and refreshed. 

Similarly, the novel Wildwood, by Drusilla Campbell, was something of an escape and a delightful departure from the heavy-themed fiction to which I normally gravitate.  It falls into a category that I fondly think of as “junk food for the brain.”  A little bit of candy or potato chip, just to jazz things up briefly, not intended to sustain or satisfy over the long term, but rather a little departure from the norm.  Campbell’s writing reminds me quite a bit of Jodi Picoult, Diane Chamberlain, maybe Anita Shreve.  Pleasant, interesting, and compelling enough to read straight through, but without the umph to make you think about it for too long after you close the book on the final pages.  I choose this kind of book when my mind is overloaded, or when I’m distracted with too much on my calendar, because reading only a few pages at a time is okay and doesn't cause me to lose the thread of the story.  And this book in particular, I chose because of its partial setting in Belize.

 I’m finding that the kinds of books set in small, vacation destination countries, like Belize, are often books that I really can’t bring myself to spend time on.  Bodice-ripper romance novels, or stories involving frivolous young Americans making fools of themselves in foreign countries, or perhaps crusty old alcoholic men estranged from their families and finding themselves embroiled in some sort of crime or mystery.  Um, no thanks … not my cup of tea.

Wildwood, which is mostly set in California, is the story of three adult women whose friendship has endured over time, distance, and the strain of a shared childhood tragedy that bound them together and tightened its hold over the years.  Two of the women, Hannah and Jeanne, have stayed close to home, cobbling together lives that have some happiness but which fester over unresolved past hurts and anxieties.  The other, Liz, escapes (there’s that word again) to France, and then to Belize where she tries to settle her spirit but finds the past continuing to haunt her.  She returns to California to visit, and realizing that her friends’ lives have been as disrupted as her own, she tries to persuade them to confront the past and release its hold on them.   

Belize is held forth as a place of beauty, serenity, peace, and comfort.  When things become difficult and painful, Liz goes there in her imagination, longing to return to her adopted home, where she feels safe and loved.  This novel won’t satisfy you if you’re seeking to understand Belize.  But if you want to examine friendship and the concept of “home,” or if you just want to get comfy and lose yourself in someone else’s story for a bit, you might enjoy this one.

Belgium: In the Company of Angels

In the Company of Angels

by N. M. Kelly

I have been unable to sort out my thoughts and, ... well, feelings ... about this slim little tale that is so unusual and perplexing.  I finished it well over a week ago and have read a couple of other books since then, but this one has not been far from my thoughts.  I can't say that I liked it, but the fact that I keep thinking about it suggests something about its quality.  There is some inherent resonance.  I can't decide if it was magical or macabre.  Or maybe it was both.

The plot is hard to describe since you're not entirely clear what is happening for much of the story.
Marie-Claire, a young Jewish girl who is living peacefully with her grandmother after the death of her parents, is the sole survivor when her village is bombed during World War II.  Or is she?  And that is the question around which the story slowly spins and over which I cannot stop mulling.   In the beginning chapter, she is plucked from the rubble of her grandmother's home and secreted away to a convent in a small Belgian village.   The nuns who save her, Mother Xavier and the postulate Anne, both have painful histories of proximity to evil that conflicts with the light and goodness inside them.  They intend to keep her hidden until she can be smuggled to safety, but strange things begin to happen, and no one is sure if they are miracles or something else entirely.

The story is full of contradictions.  There's Anne's romance with a Nazi lieutenant, who later believes her dead and finds himself shooting across an open field at a runaway Jewish child and the nun who is sheltering her, not realizing that he's trying to kill the woman he loves.  And Remy, the village chocolate maker who secretly delivers truffles to the convent each week, each batch more bitter than before as the war continues and he realizes that life will never be the same.  Marie-Claire is innocent and child-like, not cognizant of the mysterious and miraculous phenomenon that follow her to the convent.  And I'm just not sure what to say about it all, other than to borrow words from an author and reader, L.K. Rigel, who reviewed it on Amazon and on Goodreads.  She captures it well by saying, "... like poetry, each word, phrase and image is loaded with deep meaning. This eerie, sweet, sad, horrible and beautiful story is loaded with small feasts for the imagination. I can speak for the book's haunting quality; the characters have not left me yet."

I found myself thinking a lot about imagination while I was reading this.  Do you ever wonder how someone conceives a story and imagines it into existence?  I think about this all the time, especially while reading something especially wonderful or, like this one, especially creative.  While reading In the Company of Angels, I wanted to understand why Kelby wrote it, what happened to plant the seeds of this strange story in her mind, and what she hoped her readers would take from it.  There isn't much written about this book other than comments offered by readers and one short review that I found on Publisher's Weekly.  I feel there must be something profound behind this one, but if so, Kelby doesn't appear to be telling what it is.  So I'll add that to the list of mysteries within the pages of this story.  I'm not sorry I read it, but I'm not sure what to do with it either, other than to leave it spinning around in my own imagination.

Belarus: Your Mouth is Lovely

Your Mouth is Lovely

by Nancy Richler

 



So this was an absolutely delightful surprise of a story and a great reminder of why I'm doing this little challenge ... to push myself to pick up books I might otherwise neglect.   Your Mouth is Lovely follows the life of Miriam, from the moment of her birth in a Belorussian schtetl, through her traditional upbringing, and into her adolescence during the Russian Revolution.  Miriam is our narrator, writing from her Siberian prison cell to the daughter who will never know her.  Except for occasional interludes from the present, we follow Miriam's journey chronologically, growing with her and gaining insight with her as she leaves behind the village's old ways and embraces the passions of her own generation.

Her early days are marked by the tragedy of her mother's death and the uneasy awareness that her birth had been insufficient to instill in her mother the will to live.  Her father, Aaron Lev, leaves her in the care of a foster mother, Lipsa, who envelopes Miriam into her warm, nurturing household and loves her dearly as her own brood of children.  Seven years later, Aaron Lev collects her when he remarries Tsila, a woman reputed to be of sour personality but who also loves Miriam as her own.  These early contrasts in Miriam's life set the stage for what lies ahead.  Things begin to change in the village ... younger women are rejecting the superstitious ways of the past, refusing to marry men chosen by matchmakers, disappearing and resurfacing years later in nearby cities with jobs and strange new ideas.  Still young and sheltered, Miriam accepts things at face value, believing what Tsila and her father tell her, not challenging or questioning what has always been.

Tsila's younger sister, Bayla is one of the women who disappears.  With one foot in the old world, Bayla is betrothed; with one foot in the new, her engagement goes on for years with no sign of nuptials ahead, and she disappears with her fiancé, Lieb.  When Tsila becomes ill, Miriam, now 16, sets off for the city to bring Bayla home.  She finds herself in an exhilarating new world where she lives and works among the young revolutionaries who are standing up for socialist reform in opposition of the Tsar and the government.  At first, Miriam involves herself not for her own ideology, but for the sake of her newfound freedom, independence, and friendship.  Slowly, without even realizing that it's happening, she comes to understand that those things she values, that make her life vibrant and enrich her days, are the very things for which the revolutionaries stand.  Her arrest is as inevitable as her emerging awareness of the world around her.

The female characters in Your Mouth is Lovely were spectacular.  I loved them all for their richness, their honesty, and their heroism during a time in history that was pivotal for all women.  Each one struggled in her own way to navigate the changes necessary to protect themselves and their loved ones and to accept that old ways of thinking would have to be left behind.  I found myself thinking a lot about "Fiddler on the Roof," a musical I performed in during high school but whose meaning, other than my excitement at playing a role I coveted, was mostly lost on my teenage self.  "Fiddler" tells the story of a father, Tevya's efforts to understand the changes going on in Russia and its surrounding areas during a time of contentious politics, religious persecution, cultural reform, and social change.  Tevya has five daughter, each of whom confronts his traditional ways of thinking by asserting herself and forcing him to change and grow.  Your Mouth is Lovely serves as a wonderful companion, telling the tale of the women's perspective ... the mothers, sisters, daughters, friends, and most importantly, through Miriam's voice, the budding female adolescent who is trying to understand and define herself when nothing around her makes much sense.

Highly recommend this one.  Bravo, Nancy Richler ... I'll be looking for more by this author.



Happy, Joyful 2016!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

 

This morning, the very first of a whole brand new year, I counted up the countries I've covered in this blog so far ... 16 ... and decided I need to take it up a notch.  My theme for the year 2016 is JOY!  And books top the list of things that feel joyful to me.  Writing about books has proven to be harder than I anticipated, and finding the right book to read for a specific country is downright impossible sometimes.  But as 2016 gets underway, I will endeavor to embrace and enjoy ... joyfully ... the entire process. 

I've selected all of the titles I plan to read for the rest of the "B" countries.  No, you can't have a sneak preview.  You'll have to wait until I read them and write about them.  But here's what I can tell you:

Belarus - I really struggled to find a book I was excited about for this tiny, former Soviet country.  Once identified, I had to special order it, and it's taking its time getting here.  Now that I'm thinking about, all of the smaller Soviet block countries are challenging for me, perhaps because search engines may pull them up as "Russia" but I'm searching on the nation's current name.  I could use help here, so if anyone has suggestions of books set in this part of the world, please share. 

           

Belgium - Harder than I thought it would be, but I'm happy with my choice.           

Benin, Bhutan, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Botswana, Brazil, Burma  - Excited about these!

Belize, Bolivia, Brunei, Bulgaria, Burkina Faso, Burundi -
Found some, but open to ideas. Email me if you have any suggestions!


The process of searching for these books was a lot of fun.  I spent several hours digging through web sites and following links and trying different combinations of words in Google.  Occasionally, I'd look up and realize an hour had passed, feel guilty, and then remind myself that it's okay to spend time on what bring you joy. 

I'm still reluctant to set a timeframe for myself when it comes to this book-reading journey, but I would like to do better than 16 books in 12 months, especially since I read nearly 60 in all of 2015.  Perhaps my word of the year should be "discipline?"