A Good Trilogy

Do you enjoy the series "Downton Abbey"?  If you do I can assure you that you will equally enjoy these three books by author Phillip Rock.

The first book of the trilogy was originally published in 1978 and the others soon after.  They were bestsellers at the time and are enjoying a revival thanks to the success of the PBS television series.  In fact, the cover of each of the re-released books contains the phrase, "Before there was Downton Abbey, there was Abingdon Pryory..."

The Passing Bells begins the trilogy.  Set in England in the summer of 1914 this book involves the complexity of the war and its effect on class barriers as both servants and family members of an English manor head out to serve.  The trilogy focuses on the lives of the Greville family of Abingdon Pryory.

Circles of Time follows the family in the post-WWI years and the re-building after the war.  This was my favorite and if I could read only one this is the one I would select.

The final book of the trilogy, A Future Arrived follows the family and its younger members in the 1930s.  At the end of that decade, war again threatens their futures.

My neighbor lent me Circles of Time and I was more than halfway through it before I realized it was the second book in a trilogy.  (Don't you just hate that?  But to his credit, he didn't know it was part of a trilogy either.)  Even before I finished the book I ordered the first book.  I enjoyed it although I already knew what lay ahead for the characters.  The writing is excellent and the plot lines held my interest throughout the books.

Better Than Summer Blockbusters

Amazing!  Four of my favorite authors have recently published or will soon publish new novels.  And here we are in beautiful active Autumn with less time to read.  I don't watch much television, so I treasure the evenings when I can settle down with a good book.  And there is reading aplenty.

Pulitzer Prize winner Louise Erdrich has written The Round House.  The novel is set in North Dakota on a Native American reservation.  It drew me into the story within the first few pages and did not lose my interest throughout.  If you have read any of her other novels, this one will definitely not disappoint (like Shadow Tag disappointed me).  A horrible attack on his mother leads a young boy to discover the truth.  Read it.  I promise you it's a good read.  My other favorites by Erdrich include The Master Butcher's Singing Club and The Last Report on the Miracles at Little No Horse.  I very much enjoyed them as well.

Author JoAnne Harris is probably best known for her novel Chocolat which was made into a successful movie.  Her newest book is Peaches for Father Francis and continues the stories of the same characters. It is the third book about them, the second being The Girl With No Shadow.  I must admit that while I enjoyed both of those books, they are far from my favorites by this author.  My favorite JoAnne Harris book is Five Quarters of the Orange, a book I like so much that I re-read it regularly.

I have only just begun Peaches for Father Francis but it feels like visiting an old friend.  Vianne Rocher returned to Lansquenet which she left four years before.  The village has changed a great deal with a community of Arab immigrants coming to live there.  So far the story involves the interactions and prejudices of both the Islamic immigrants and the villagers.  Central to the story is Father Francis Reynaud, the priest who so resented Vianne when she and her small daughter first opened a chocolate shop during Lent across the street from the church.

The Secret Keeper, Kate Morton's newest novel will be released October 16.  If you have read any of her  previous novels (and I recommend you read them all), you are surely looking forward to this one.  Set in England, the story moves from the time before WWII to the present.  I have read three other novels, The House at Riverton, the Forgotten Garden, and The Distant Hours by Kate Morton and have thoroughly enjoyed all three.  Great writing and interesting character development in all of them.

Most eagerly awaited of all the new books is Flight Behavior by Barbara Kingsolver to be published on November 6.  I know of no other author whose research is so extensive or who writes so wonderfully.  I have loved all of her books but my favorite is The Poisonwood Bible, another book I re-read from time to time.

If I were forced to name a favorite author, it would almost certainly be Barbara Kingsolver.  I am most particularly interested in this upcoming publication because the setting is in the Appalachian Mountains!  And the story involves the effects of global warming, an issue that concerns me a great deal.  I can assure you that Kingsolver has done her research and will not disappoint.  I can't wait for this one and if I haven't finished the others I will gladly put them aside in order to read it.

I have a wide reading interest, so I can always find a good book.  At a given time I have three or so books in progress.  But it is rare that four of my favorite authors publish new books in less than six weeks.  Yeah!!!

What Do You Mean, No Prize for Fiction?

I read a lot.  I have several sources for good books.  We are fortunate to have an independent book store here in town and I find quite a few good books while browsing there.  They know me and my reading habits so they often recommend books.  All the local book clubs post their monthly selections (which the store discounts) and I often find a book among the list.  Sometimes I hear about a book on NPR or from the newspapers.  I have friends who often tell me about certain books.  I have to admit I've been known to buy a book purely because the cover attracted me to it.  Often I buy books because of a particular author.

And every year I look forward to the Pulitzer Prize winners.  I always read the fiction winner and sometimes I love it and other times I really don't care much about it.  But I can always understand how the book came to win the coveted prize.

Imagine my surprise when this  year's Pulitzer Prizes were announced.  AND THERE WAS NO PULITZER AWARDED FOR FICTION!!!  I feel cheated.  Shouldn't there always be a winner?  Like in the Academy Awards?  (Can you imagine if the Academy announced there would be no award for movie of the year?)  My surprise morphed into anger.  What kind of idiots allowed this to happen?

I heard one of the jurors on NPR's Morning Edition.  Juror Susan Larson was also shocked and angry.  And so were her two fellow jurors, Maureen Corrigan and Michael Cunningham.  Over a period of six months, the jurors read more than three hundred nominated novels and short story collections.  After much negotiation in person, through conference calls and emails, the jury submitted three works as finalists for the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction 2012.  Here they are in no particular order:

A posthumously completed novel about boredom and bureaucracy in our workplace.

Told in the first person, a dysfunctional family in a failing alligator wrestling theme park.

About a day laborer in the "Old West"

As far as I know, no one has any idea why the Pulitzer Board did not award the Pulitzer to one of the three finalists.  Were none of them thought to be worthy?  Were they dismissing the work of the three jurors?  Was it simply that the board members were fiercely divided about their own preference and refused to come to a consensus?  The only explanation that has been presented is:  the board could not reach a majority vote on any of the novels.

Not since 1977 has there been a year without a Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.  The board's failure to name a winner is not acceptable as far as I am concerned.  Especially when there is little reason for the failure.  I hope all three books were so vigorously defended that no one would move.  But we may never know.  And that is a shame.

For my part, dear authors and publishers...I will purchase and read all three of these books.  And for my part, a big THANK YOU to Susan Larson, Maureen Corrigan and Michael Cunningham for your diligent work.

And to the mystical body of the Pulitzer Board?  A BIG RASPBERRY!!!  If you can't do your job, send in replacements.

Our Next Holiday

It wasn't until 1983 that Congress passed a bill to honor Martin Luther King, Jr. with a Federal holiday.  The bill was vociferously opposed by many Senators and Representatives, most notably and loudly by North Carolina Senator Jesse Helms.  President Ronald Reagan had threatened to veto the bill.  He relented when the numbers approving passage would override his veto.  He signed to bill into law.

Many states did not want to have another holiday in general and some of them did not want to honor King specifically.  Various names were developed to avoid calling the holiday Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day.

Martin Luther King, Jr. has been dead for more years than he lived on earth.

While I was too young to care much about the landmark 1954 civil rights case of Brown v. Board of Education I was an eager participant in marches promoting the enforcement of the Civil Rights Act passed in 1964.

I had quite an awakening when I realized how segregated my life had been.  I grew up in a mountain town with a very small black population.  I never attended school with a black person until I went to college.  I assumed that the separation of people by race was everyone's preference.

My parents were basically good people, but they resented King, his marches, and the Freedom Riders.  To them, northern agitators were stirring up problems in the south.  After all, "our negroes" were quite happy with the way things were and would be uncomfortable going to school with whites.  Despite the feelings of my parents, at an early age I was mesmerized by the speeches of Martin Luther King.  I admired what he said and his words gave me more understanding of racial problems than any other single thing.  Perhaps my sharpest and most painful memory was the sight of young children attacked by dogs and fierce flow from water hoses.  When I watched it crying, my parents were not pleased and sent me to my room.

I have since read the three volumes of Taylor Branch's histories about the civil rights movement.  I can highly recommend these books although they are very lengthy and in great detail.  I can assure you that whether you lived through the movement, or read about it in school, these books will shed light on how things were and how they moved forward.

 Parting the Waters chronicles the happenings between 1954 and 1963, and earned Branch the Pulitzer Prize for history.

 Pillar of Fire covers the years 1963-1965.

 At Canaan's Edge, the final book in the trilogy covers America between 1965 and 1968.

It will take you quite a while to read the entire trilogy, but it will definitely be time well spent.  I am fascinated by the history of blacks in the south.  [NOTE:  I do not use the phrase "African-American."  Most blacks are no more African than I am Irish.  In general, we do not refer to people based on the home of their long-dead ancestors.  I really hate it when I hear people talk about an African-American in the UK, a person who has never even visited the United States!)   I especially love reading about the local Civil Rights Movement and our area's involvement in the Civil War.

Here in the mountains, there was little slavery and loyalties were divided house by house (and often within the same house) during the Civil War.  The women left behind were more often threatened by the scalawags who remained than by the Union Army.  There were slaves in western North Carolina, generally brought to the area to serve the wealthy plantation owners who came to the mountains for a respite from the hot summers in South Carolina and Georgia.  With a few exceptions, slaves who might have died here were buried in separate, often unmarked graves.  There were some cemeteries that allotted a portion to be used for blacks, but the graves were usually not marked by name.  One of our local cemeteries contains a large area of graves marked by stones with no engraving at all.  These stones mark the graves of the black slaves buried there.

 This section of the cemetery is marked by a large stone with the following plaque:

If you wish to honor Dr. King, then make next Monday a day of doing service.  And if you want a more comprehensive understanding of the Civil Rights Movement in America, start reading Branch's books.

Staying on the Learning Curve

Had you asked me anything about John Brown last month, I could have given the answer quickly:

1. He was an abolishionist
2. He led a raid on Harpers Ferry before the Civil War
3. He was hanged
4. His body lies a'mouldering in the grave

That extensive level of knowledge comes from one of the few times I ever gave John Brown a thought.  The information is recalled from my high school American History class.  Our textbook devoted two whole paragraphs to John Brown and the raid on Harpers Ferry.  It was accompanied by a sketch of the armory at Harpers Ferry.  We studied little about the raid and its real implications and did not touch at all on the man himself.

So what have I learned about John Brown since last month?  Tons.  For instance:

• The Harpers Ferry raid was not the first incident in which John Brown killed innocent people.  He already had a long history of violent acts in Kansas.  He was a zealot who believed that any actions taken to free the slaves was justified by God.  He met with escaped slave, orator and writer Frederick Douglass but Douglass refused to participate in his activities.
• Robert E. Lee, then a Colonel in the U.S. Army, led the sucessful attack on the armory where John Brown, his men, and his hostages were sequestered.  His second in command was Lt. J.E.B. Stuart.  Major Thomas Jackson was among the soldiers fighting John Brown.  Major Jackson would later be known as "Stonewall" Jackson.
• John Brown sustained significant injury during the attack but survived.  He orated eloquently at his trial and many people had great respect for his bravery during his confinement in jail, his trial, and most especially during his hanging.
• Henry David Thoreau  gave an oration on Brown's behalf,  It was later published as "A Plea for Captain John Brown."
• Louisa May Alcott wrote of John Brown, "Living he made life beautiful - Dying, made death devine."
• Herman Melville, on the other hand, called John Brown "The Meteor of War."
• John Wilkes Booth stood among the citizens watching the hanging of John Brown.

How did I come to know all this (and MUCH more) about John Brown?  I read Midnight Rising, written by Tony Horwitz.  I am a lover of history so I might be a bit prejudiced but I truly enjoyed this book.  Thoroughly researched and annotated, the book flows as easily as a novel.

I have listed only a few points but unless you are a history professor or buff it is a certainty that you will learn a great deal about the Harpers Ferry raid and what it meant and how it affected our nation's history.

I have often repeated that one of the very best things about retirement is having the time to read.  At a given time I usually have three books in process; a novel, a biography, and a non-fiction book.  When I started reading Midnight Rising I did not read anything from the other two books in process.

Next up?  In the Garden of Beasts by Erik Larson.  My husband enjoyed this story about the American Ambassador to Hitler's Germany in 1933.  And on the shelf waiting a turn is LOST IN SHANGRI-LA BY Mitchell Zuckoff.  Another true story about WWII, this book details an amazing rescue mission in the Pacific.

I hope you can find some time to read something that expands your knowledge about our country.  I think it was Mahatma Gandhi who said, "Live as if you will die tomorrow.  Learn as if you were to live forever."

A Pretty Complete Education

My name is Carolyn and I am a book lover.  I last bought a book less than a week ago.  I love not only the contents but also the look and feel of books.  (Yes, I have a Kindle.  And yes, I do download and read books on it but it will never replace a real book for me.)  Not surprisingly, we own a lot of books.  We have a small library, and we have more books than the library can handle.  We recycle books periodically to make room for more.  A stack of books is always waiting to exit to friends or organizations.

Given my love for books, it is no wonder that I especially love collections.  There is one collection that I especially enjoy not only for the contents but also for the history behind the collection.  The Harvard Classics was published in fifty-one volumes in 1909.  With more than twenty-three thousand pages it is a very comprehensive collection.

Our own set of Harvard Classics

 Some say the collection is fifty books.  The additional book is an anthology of lectures that completes the set of fifty one.

My paternal grandmother introduced me to the Harvard Classics when I was a small child.  Grandma was a school teacher and a book lover and she valued her set of Harvard Classics above all books except for the Holy Bible and her dictionary.  She managed to have nine children and still teach school.  On occasion she taught in a neighboring county.  She took the school-aged children with her to board for the week and attend her one-room school and employed a live-in housekeeper to care for the house and the smaller children.  She and the children would come home on Friday afternoon and return to the boarding house Sunday night.  Grandma wasn't much for cooking and cleaning and she treasured her years as a teacher and a life-long learner.

Grandma allowed me to read some of the books, but only when I was the only grandchild around.  She didn't want her books damaged.  When I was a teen, she started receiving the "Reader's Digest" Condensed Books.  She had always said I should not read condensed versions of anything because the editors did not always know what parts should be eliminated in the process.  When I mentioned that to Grandma she said, "Well, I'm getting pretty old and I may not have time to read all the things I want to read.  Reading a condensed version is better than not reading the book at all."

I regret that I did not get to have Grandma's set of Harvard Classics, but I always think of her when I pull one of ours from the shelf.  Like many others, Grandma bought the Harvard Classics from a traveling salesman.  It was common in the early 1900s for peddlars to visit rural areas to sell their wares.  Grandma saved a little money every week in order to purchase the next book in the collection.  I'm not sure how long it took for her to complete the set.

You will find the contents of the Harvard Classics absolutely mind-boggling.  Here is a quick summary.  Edited by Charles William Eliot, the collection was also known as "Dr. Eliot's Five Foot Shelf."  His stated desire was that the collection would be "all things to all men."  (Remember the time here folks.  Gender neutrality wasn't even a dream back then.)

Who knows how many young men and women enhanced their educations and broadened their thinking with the Harvard Classics?  The collection is amazing more than a century after it was published.  Wonder why no one has come up with an anthology like this for the twentieth century?

At Least Three

"How many books ARE you reading," asked my husband. He reads one book at a time along with his favorite periodicals. I, on the other hand am reading at least three books at a given time, and often more than that.

Learning to read was one of the most exciting events of my life. I do not remember exactly when that happened, but I know that I instantly became an avid reader from that day forward. As a child, I devoured the Lois Lenski books, the Nancy Drew books, and the "Little House" books. All right, I admit it...I'm so old I also read the Bobbsey Twins. But I was really young at the time.

While my taste in books has become more sophisticated over the years, my love for reading hasn't diminished at all. When I was working full time, I bought books throughout the year to read on vacation. Now that I have retired, I can read almost as much as I want. It's wonderful.

Right now I am reading The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson. It is the first book of a trilogy, and Larsson died shortly after completing the three manuscripts. Translated from the Swedish language in which it was written, this book is a barn burner. The plot is absolutely engrossing with great characters and delightfully twisting plots. It is definitely not a book to read at bedtime. I am loving every page.




Another book in process is The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, a non-fiction book by Rebecca Skloot. I have known about HeLa cells since my days in college, but until recently I had no idea the origin of the name, nor the background information of their existence. HeLa (named for the first two letters of Henrietta Lacks) cells were the first cells to continue to grow and divide outside the human body. Discovered in 1951, they have been used for scientific study to benefit all of us.

While not the best-written book I have come across, the story is nonetheless quite interesting. The book tells the story of Henrietta Lacks and gives a good view of medicine and our culture in the '50s. The cells of Henrietta Lacks live on, continue to divide, and continue to be used in research. For years the family was unaware of the use of her cells and the controversy regarding the ethics of the use is central to the book. There is a monetary issue as well, since HeLa cells are grown and sold commercially with no remuneration to the surviving family.





Finally, my "pick up and put down but don't take with you to a doctor's appointment" book is Game Change by John Heilemann and Mark Halperin. The book details the 2008 presidential election. If half the book is true, it will dramatically change some of your perceptions about politics in general and the campaign in specific. The book confirms many of your opinions about the individual players, and some of your heroes may be portrayed as shrews.

The weekend was good for reading. After a glimpse of warm spring-like weather, the temperatures dropped and we had three inches of rain. And this morning we have SNOW on the ground!!! Strange weather indeed.

Fridays are Golden

You might be thinking, "Why is she starting 'Golden Friday' with books?" The answer is simple. I'M GOING ON VACATION!!! I love to read, and back in the days when I was working full time (and more), I treasured the opportunity to read books on vacation. Old habits die hard, so I have two books I'll take on vacation. I'm taking only two books because I have some knitting projects to work on as well. Too bad I cannot read or knit in the car or I would get a lot done during our 10-hour drive.

I always read about fifty pages of each book just to make certain it will hold my interest and will be "worthy" of being a vacation book. This almost backfired when I started reading The Forgotten Garden by Kate Morton. I read my fifty pages and couldn't stop! I've read almost half the book already and I can definitely recommend this as a really good read. This second book by Kate Morton is very different from The House at Riverton and while I thoroughly enjoyed that book, this one is far more entertaining. In fact, it's difficult to believe the two books were written by the same author (although both of them are good). [Thanks dear daughter, for bringing it to my attention. You always know what I will like.]



The other book I'm taking is Dan Brown's new book. While it won't be great literature, it will certainly hold my interest and that's what a vacation book is all about.

Unfortunately, we won't be taking the Golden Girls with us. They will be well-cared for and have a good time at "camp" while we are gone. On our last sunny day, we took them to one of their favorite places...Big Hill Cemetery. Ordinarily they run in the forest, but Big Hill has open grassy areas and they just love sprinting there.

Ellie leads the way and Lucy follows.

Lucy looks as if she has Dumbo ears in this one. She was flying!

Ellie trots along enjoying the leaf-covered grass.

Lucy is slowing down, but not stopping.

Ellie sits down to catch her breath.

Meanwhile, Lucy keeps going.

Finally, we make them sit for awhile to rest. They are watching my husband who has just told them to sit.

Smile if you're happy, girls.

The condo we're renting has Internet access so I will be checking your blogs. (Well, after I finish reading The Forgotten Garden.). I won't be posting at all next week. It's vacation after all.

HAVE A WONDERFUL WEEKEND AND A REALLY GOOD WEEK NEXT WEEK.