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Alone on a Wide Wide Sea by Michael Morpurgo

Aug19

This middle grade or young adult novel, by the author of War Horse and Private Peaceful and many other excellent titles, takes place in Australia—and on the ocean. Part 1 of the book is The Story of Arthur Hobhouse, a British orphan who at the tender age of six years old is sent to Australia to live with foster parents in an orphanage in Cooper’s Station. Arthur’s story has its ups and downs, some of it quite harrowing. There’s child abuse, and outback survival, and the sad death of one of the main characters, which is why maybe the book is more for older teens and adults. But it’s a good and ultimately hopeful story, and I liked the fact that almost none of the characters in the book is all good or all bad. They are a mixture for the most part (except for the main villain with an appropriate name, Piggy Bacon).

Part 2 is The Voyage of the Kitty Four, the story of how Arthur’s daughter Allie takes the boat her father built for her and sails from Australia to England, alone. It’s an ocean adventure, reminiscent of one of my favorite true life adventure stories, The Boy Who Sailed ‘Round the World Alone (aka Dove) by Robin Graham. Allie’s story also has ups and downs, not just on waves, but also in her emotional state as she faces the dangers of sea by herself and learns to rely on her own resources.

There’s some hostility to religion and Christianity in the book since Arthur’s first experiences of “Christianity” are horrifying and anything but Christlike. There’s also a bit of superstition—because if you can’t rely on God then you might tend to look for signs and wonders, right? But these things all made the book more rich and understandable for me. People do have bad experiences with abusive, religious people, and sometimes an albatross could be a sign of God’s love and protection. Allie and Arthur both have a deep love for Colerige’s The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, so that’s a thread throughout both stories.

Good book by a very good author. I’ve enjoyed all of the books by Michael Morpurgo that I’ve read.

The Chequer Board by Nevil Shute

Jul24

I have had this book on my TBR list for a few years, but I haven’t been able to find a copy anywhere, not in my big city library system, not at the local used bookstores. So when I found a copy at the Blooms’ little bookstore, I was delighted. Britisher Nevil Shute (Norway) is most famous for two of his other books, On the Beach, an apocalyptic novel about nuclear holocaust, and A Town Like Alice, a story of post-World War II development in the outback of Australia. However, I’ve enjoyed others of his books, too, including The Pied Piper, The Far Country, and Trustee from the Toolroom.

So, The Chequer Board begins with Mr. John Turner going to see a doctor, a specialist, for help with some troubling physical symptoms that have been interfering with his life and work as a sort of traveling salesman for the company, Cereal Products, Ltd. Mr. Turner’s life is about to take a “turn” for the worse when he receives the news from the doctor that an old war injury is about to take his life. Mr. Turner only has a few months, maybe a year, to live.

Dr. Hughes, who is a sort of framing narrator for the novel, appearing only in the first and last chapters, is not terribly impressed with his patient, John Turner, at first. The good doctor describes Turner as “not very prepossessing. He was about forty years old with a fresh complexion and sandy hair, going a little bald. He had a jaunty air of cheerfulness and bonhomie which did not fit in well with my consulting room; he was the sort of man who would be the life and soul of the party in the saloon bar of a good-class pub, or at the races. He was wearing rather a bright brown suit with a very bright tie, and he carried a bowler hat.” With the added information that this book was published in 1947 and takes place in about that year, can’t you just picture Mr. Turner, in all his florid, Willie Loman-esque splendor?

Mr. Turner reminded me of Willie Loman (Death of a Salesman) in other ways, too. Turner is a little bit crooked, we find out, not above taking advantage of an opportunity to make a good deal on the side or skim a little money off a sale. Otherwise, he says, the taxes would make it impossible for a man to get ahead at all. And he and his wife have settled into a rather typical middle class life, with not much in common, and a lot of low-level wrangling and mis-communication between the two of them. The news of Mr. Turner’s imminent death changes everything.

Turner begins to reminisce about the time he spent in hospital with three other injured servicemen, and he becomes fixated on finding the other three men and helping them, if they need help. As it turns out, Turner is more helped by the search and by what he finds out about his three fellow hospital mates than he is able to help them.

I must have been in just the right mood for this novel. There’s some World War II adventure involved, and themes of racial harmony and overcoming adversity, but it’s really just a gentle, rather philosophical, story about people muddling their way through life. My own life is in sort of a muddle right now, and I appreciated Mr. Turner’s frequent, though cliched reminder that “we’ll all be the same in a hundred years.” In spite of its tendency to promote Buddhism and denigrate Christianity, the novel was still a comfort to me. It’s about normal, average people dealing with the war and its aftermath in interesting and somewhat unpredictable ways.

The characters do make frequent (and jarring to a 21st century reader) use of the n-word in reference to a black American soldier who was one of Turner’s three hospital mates. The word was fairly typical, I think, in 1947 in England and in America, and perhaps didn’t carry quite the same derogatory meaning in British parlance? Anyway, the book treats its black characters and other POC characters (Burmese) with respect and understanding, while showing how many people in the 1940’s did not do the same.

The title of this book by Mr. Shute is fun to think about, too. It could refer to the past events that Mr. Turner explores in the book, chequered with light and dark. Or the theme of white and colored people reaching for racial reconciliation and even community is another meaning that finds an apt image in the light and dark chequerboard. The idea that life is a sort of game in which one makes moves either good or bad, and that in consequence each person might be reincarnated as a higher or lower being than he was before is also alluded to in the title and in the story.

The Wonderful Year by Nancy Barnes

Aug9

I found this book at a local public library, and I was rather surprised to discover it in the middle of the vampires and the magical worlds and the middle school angst: a realistic, turn of the century setting story, published in 1946, about an only child, Ellen, who travels from Kansas to Colorado with her lawyer father and her adventurous mother to start a fruit-growing farm. The family is also in search of a rest cure and healthy situation for Father, who has been prescribed fresh air and exercise to alleviate the pain in his neck. Ellen, who is a worrier like her father, is reluctant to leave her friends in Kansas, but Mother is excited about the the new venture and soon talks Ellen into joining in her eager anticipation.

Ah, I see now why the book is still on the shelves at the library; it won a Newbery Honor in 1947. And I would say the honor was well-deserved. The pace and atmosphere of the story is reminiscent of Ruth Sawyer’s Roller Skates or of the Betsy books by Maud Hart Lovelace, especially the older Betsy books in which Betsy goes to middle school and high school. Ellen is eleven as the story begins, and she has her twelfth birthday near the end of the book, but as only children tend to be, she’s somewhat mature for her age. One of the themes of the novel is about growing up and staying a child and not growing up too fast nor being too impatient to leave one’s childhood behind. Ellen makes friends with a fifteen year old boy, Ronnie, who lives nearby, and there is some understated tension about whether the two can remain friends and comrades in adventure when Ronnie is so much older and interested in girls his own age while still enjoying Ellen’s company as a friend. The interpersonal give and take is very well written, and I would love for my early teen and pre-teen girls to read the story and then discuss the possibilities that are suggested about boys and girls being friends and not having to get jealous of one another or have crushes.

Another area for discussion would be the “sexist” and “feminist” stereotypes that the characters seem to take for granted. Boys don’t cry. Girls need to be more like boys, tough and hardy, if they are to be seen as equal partners in adventure. It’s important for a girl to “find her own place, stand on her her own two feet, and not cling to anyone.” Are these true lessons? How is Ellen “like a girl”? How is she “like a boy”? Are these really even useful descriptions?

At the risk of being sexist myself, I would recommend The Wonderful Year for girls ages eleven to thirteen who want to read more about girls in other times and places. Fans of Betsy-Tacy, the Little House books, the American Girl series, or other girls-in-history realistic fiction should enjoy this coming of age story. And Colorado readers would especially enjoy this look at the history of Colorado settlement and farming. The illustrations in the book are by author and illustrator Kate Seredy, and they are quite lovely in their own right. Pen and ink, or perhaps pencil, drawings show Ellen and her family and friends in the thick of their homesteading experiences, and the expressive faces and captured actions add a lot to the story.

I would love to have a copy of this book for my library, and I’ll be adding it to my wishlist, which is growing much too long for the available shelf space in my library.

Pilgrim’s Inn by Elizabeth Goudge

May18


I am so enjoying my discovery and exploration of Elizabeth Goudge’s novels. In February I read The Dean’s Watch, and I wrote that it might the best book I read this year. I read The Rosemary Tree last summer–and relished the author’s insight into human psychology. I also read Gentian Hill in 2014, and I put it on my list of ten best adult fiction books I read last year. Charlotte of Charlotte’s Library has recommended Valley of Song to me, and many, many readers have recommended Ms. Goudge’s children’s fantasy The Little White Horse. I think Goudge is the sort of author that I’m going to enjoy stretching out and reading in a leisurely manner, two or three of her books per year, spaced out over the course of the year.

That said, Pilgrim’s Inn was lovely, and it made me crave more Goudgian writing. I’m trying to think what actually happens in the story. A family buys an old inn and moves to the country. One character struggles with a “mental breakdown” in the aftermath of World War II. Various characters struggle with their own secret sins and temptations. One married couple falls in love with each other all over again, and another man and woman learn to love each other in spite of the difficulties and impediments to their union. Children act like children and do very childlike things, but the insight into child psychology and children’s thought lives is amazing. Altogether, it’s not at all a plot-driven novel, and I can see how today’s readers, trained by television and movies, would find it slow and somewhat sentimental, perhaps becoming restless and even bored. I had to consciously slow myself down and appreciate the unhurried pace of the story and of life in the English countryside with people who are still trying to build new lives after the hour of the war.

The inn itself is a sort of a magical place, and several encounters and chance meetings in the woods nearby produce healing and psychological breakthroughs. The air and atmosphere of the novel is Christian without the spiritual underpinnings becoming intrusive or didactic. The characters grow and learn and make surprising decisions and revelations, just as people do in real life.

I can’t imagine a more enjoyable summer reading book than Pilgrim’s Inn. Slow down and enjoy a sojourn in post-war England with some really intriguing people living in a wonder-filled place. Oh, I forgot that there’s a matriarch in the story who begs to played in a movie version by Maggie Smith. They had better hurry up and make the movie because I can’t imagine anyone else playing the part. Do you ever cast the characters in your favorite books?

“As this world becomes increasingly ugly, callous and materialistic it needs to be reminded that the old fairy stories are rooted in truth, that imagination is of value, that happy endings do, in fact, occur, and that the blue spring mist that makes an ugly street look beautiful is just as real a thing as the street itself.” ~Elizabeth Goudge

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1947: Events and inventions

Jan9

Starting in early 1947: A collection of 972 texts from the Hebrew Bible and extra-biblical documents are found between 1947 and 1956 on the northwest shore of the Dead Sea at Khirbet Qumran in the British Mandate for Palestine. These Scripture fragments are collectively called the Dead Sea Scrolls.

'Detail From A Dead Sea Scroll' photo (c) 2010, Ken and Nyetta - license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/

January 15, 1947. Communists take power in Poland with the support of the Soviet Union.

February 21, 1947. In New York City, Edwin Land demonstrates the first “instant camera”, his Polaroid Land Camera, to a meeting of the Optical Society of America.

March 12, 1947. The Truman Doctrine, a policy set forth by U.S. President Harry S Truman in a speech on this date, states that the U.S. will support Greece and Turkey with economic and military aid to prevent their falling into the Soviet (communist) sphere. Historians often consider Truman’s speech to be the start of the Cold War.

June 5, 1947. U.S. Secretary of State George Marshall reveals his plan for the reconstruction of war-torn Europe. Called the Marshall Plan, the goal was to make Europe prosperous again through monetary aid to European economies. Over the next four years, the U.S. will give $13 billion to the countries of Western and Central Europe, including Germany. More aid goes to France and to The United Kingdom than to any other nations.

'The Kon-tiki raft' photo (c) 2009, Nenyaki - license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/2.0/August 7, 1947. Thor Heyerdahl’s balsa wood raft, the Kon-Tiki, smashes into the reef at Raroia in the Tuamotu Islands after a 101 day, 4,300 mile, voyage across the Eastern Pacific Ocean, proving that pre-historic peoples could hypothetically have traveled to the Central Pacific islands from South America.

August 15, 1947. The British Raj in India is replaced with the independent countries of India and East and West Pakistan. East Pakistan later (1971) becomes the independent nation of Bangladesh. In September in the newly partitioned states, violence between Hindus and Muslims kills thousands.

August 31, 1947. The communists seize power in Hungary, with the military support of the Soviet Union.

October 14, 1947. American pilot Chuck Yeager becomes the first person to fly faster than the speed of sound.

November, 1947. The United Nations votes in favor of the partition of Palestine and the creation of a new Jewish state, Israel.

December, 1947. The first transistor is patented by American physicist William Shockley.

What I Saw and How I Lied by Judy Blundell

Jan11

I just got around to reading Ms. Blundell’s National Book Award-winning young adult novel this weekend. If it wasn’t a 2008 publication, I would add it to my list of Best YA Books of 2009. It was nominated for the 2009 Cybils in the YA Fiction category, probably because it was published toward the end of 2008. And I’m not second guessing the panelists, but there must be some extra-fine books on the finalist list to have beaten this one out.

The setting and atmosphere reminded me of Mad Men and The Great Gatsby, although it takes place about a year after the end of World War II, in between Jay Gatsby’s follies (1922) and Don Draper’s escapades (1960’s). The setting and characters feel historically authentic, kind of film noir, with lots of cigarettes and Scotch and red lipstick and dancing and full skirts like those in White Christmas. I could imagine Alfred Hitchcock making a movie of this book, but I don’t know of anyone nowadays who could do it with the right touch.

The story itself is Hitchcock-ish, with “adultery, blackmail, and possible homicide,” very much dependent on the reader’s point of view, with a few surprising twists and turns along the way. I can imagine a very young Grace Kelly playing the lead part, a fifteen year old named Evie who has a crush on a twenty-three year old ex-GI named Peter (Jimmy Stewart or Cary Grant?). There are a lot of scenes in which it’s obvious that something else is going on underneath the surface of the dialog, but it’s not so obvious just what that something else is. Hitchcock would have had a blast with camera angles and the characters’ complicated interactions.

The book is quite well-written. Evie, the narrator, has a voice that is vintage 1940’s and typical fifteen year old girl, going on forty, anxious to grow up and unsure of how. I chose a few lines to whet your appetite, almost at random:

“Now I recognized that other woman, the one I’d seen angry and turning her face away. All that pizzazz and underneath it was a whole lot of sad.”

“Ugly. Once in the schoolyard Herbie Connell threw a rock and it hit me in the back. This felt like that, ugly hitting me in the back. . . . I wanted to put my hands over my ears. I was gulping my tears into my mouth. I didn’t want to hear any more ugly tonight. So I ran.”

“I looked like a doll, a dish. The image in the mirror—it wasn’t me. If I had the clothes and the walk, I could make up a whole new person. I wasn’t who I used to be, anyway. A different me would do the thing I had to do today. The dish would do it.”

What I Saw and How I Lied is well worth your reading time as a coming-of-age novel, or a psychological thriller, or a study in family dynamics, or just a thoughtful, insight-filled romance. I found it intriguing, hard to put down, and fun to try to figure out.

Other bloggers said:

Bookshelves of Doom: “Evie Spooner’s story is a coming-of-age story. Like a lot of coming-of-age stories, there is a tragedy. Like a lot of coming-of-age stories, there is a first love. Like a lot of coming-of-age stories, our heroine learns that the adults in her life are not the shining stars she has always believed them to be. There are lies, there is betrayal, there is injustice, and Evie sees it all. Heck, as the title suggests, she participates in some of it.”

The Reading Zone: “I hate to summarize the book, because Judy Blundell has woven an intricate story, full of dark twists and turns down paths you can’t even imagine. There is murder, intrigue, a fascinating backdrop of World War II, racism, classism, and a classic (but dark) coming-of-age story. To summarize more would give away too much of the plot and I would hate to ruin it for anyone.”

The YA YA YA’S: “Blundell did an amazing job creating a moody, atmospheric, noirish novel. You can practically see the action unfurling before your eyes, complete with cigarette smoke wafting toward the ceiling. The atmosphere is so evocative that it elevates the quality of the book.”

At 5 Minutes for Books they’re inviting you to share a review that you read at anyone’s recommendation. I read What I Saw and How I Lied because of the many, many reviews I saw in the Kidlitosphere and because it won a National Book Award.

All the King’s Men by Robert Penn Warren

Apr10

Once upon a time, about twenty-five years ago, I read a biography of Huey “Kingfish” Long, and I only remember the highlights: Huey ran Louisiana in the 1930’s, was a populist to end all populists, had a proposed program called “Share the Wealth,” and was assassinated by some guy who was in turn shot by Long’s bodyguard(s). Robert Penn Warren’s 1947 Pulitzer prize winning fictional account of the life and times of Willie Stark, popular governor of an unnamed Southern state, pretty much follows the general outline of what I remember of Long’s career. However, it’s been a long time, so I can’t vouch for the details.

The book is much more than Huey Long renamed and fictionalized, however. It’s an exploration of how power corrupts, of how we’re all, as Willie says, “conceived in sin and born in corruption.” The novel is misnamed. It’s either about Willie and one of his men, the narrator, Jack Burden. Or it’s about all the King’s women —his long-suffering wife, Lucy, his mistress, Sadie, and his upper class lover, Anne. For a Southern novel it’s strangely silent on the subject of race and race relations. It seems that in the Louisiana of Willie Stark, black people are to be seldom seen and definitely not heard. It’s the white voters who count, and Willie has a gift for making the poor white hicks of rural Louisiana feel as if they’re an important part of the power structure. He’s one of them, he says, a hick, too, raised up by God to lead them on to good roads, decent sanitation, free education, and universal health care. And he’ll pay for it all by taxing the rich. Gee, haven’t we all heard that speech before? Maybe old Huey/Willie has been reincarnated several times since the 1930’s.

“For what reason, barring Original Sin, is a man most likely to step over the line?
Ambition, love, fear, money.”

All the King’s Men explores all of these motivations for sin and corruption. The novel’s characters display the consequences of action and of inaction in a world in which the choices are between using evil means to create some possible (corrupt) good or remaining pure by not participating in the world, particularly the world of politics, at all. I think there is a Third Way, as Bill Clinton and Tony Blair would say, but perhaps I am mistaken. Or perhaps in Louisiana there are only two possibilities: become corrupted by the process or stand back and let the corrupt men rule the state.

It seems to me that all this should relate to New Orleans post-Katrina, but I’m not sure how it does.

County Chronicle by Angela Thirkell

May31

I just finished reading County Chronicle by Angela Thirkell. The book begins with a proposal and then a marriage and ends with two proposals, marriages yet to come (in the next book?). So it’s a comedy, right? Angela Thirkell seems to have published about one book a year from 1930 until 1959–32 books in all by my count. This book, published in 1950, actually takes place two or three years after WW II. The problems in the novel, although distressing to the characters, involve nothing more serious than a lack of petrol, uncomfortable living arrangements, and unkind relatives. Still the story manages to hold my interest and keep me reading, and lately that’s an accomplishment. I’m supposing that these books are more or less like an English country soap opera and that the characters continue from one book to the next. Actually, the main complaint I have about the book is that there are so many characters, and they’re hard to keep sorted. Nevertheless, Ms. Thirkell has a gift for vivid description and interesting situations. And it’s all very clerical and gentle and pleasantly English. I already have another book by the same author, Private Enterprises that I plan to read next (even though it comes before the one I just read). Maybe someone should do a soap opera based on these books. Lifetime network? It would be a nice change from woman in danger and disease of the week.