“The first time I read an excellent work, it is to me just as if I gained a new friend; and when I read over a book I have perused before, it resembles the meeting of an old one.” ~Sir James Goldsmith
Welcome to the Saturday Review of Books at Semicolon. Here’s how it usually works. Find a book review on your blog posted sometime during the previous week. The review doesn’t have to be a formal sort of thing. You can link to your thoughts on a particular book, a few ideas inspired by reading the book, your evaluation, quotations, whatever.
Then on Friday night/Saturday, you post a link here at Semicolon in Mr. Linky to the specific post where you’ve written your book review. Don’t link to your main blog page because this kind of link makes it hard to find the book review, especially when people drop in later after you’ve added new content to your blog. In parentheses after your name, add the title of the book you’re reviewing. This addition will help people to find the reviews they’re most interested in reading.
After linking to your own reviews, you can spend as long as you want reading the reviews of other bloggers for the week and adding to your wishlist of books to read. That’s how my own TBR list has become completely unmanageable and the reason I can’t join any reading challenges. I have my own personal challenge that never ends.
I have had this memoir on my TBR shelf for a long time, but I finally got the urge to go ahead and read it when Brown Bear Daughter left about a week ago to go back to Slovakia for her third summer mission trip there. Dominika Dery’s memoir of her childhood lived under Communist rule in a village on the outskirts of Prague, Czechoslovakia, obviously doesn’t take place in Slovakia, but rather in the Czech Republic. However, it’s as close as I can get right now. (Does anyone know a really good book, fiction or memoir, set in Slovakia?)
Dominika grew up in a loving home with her mother, a writer of technical reports, and her father, a former economist who is now a taxi-driver, and her much-older sister, who comes across mostly as a spoiled brat and a world-class flirt. Dominika herself seems to be somewhat spoiled, but not a brat. The parents are dissidents associated with the 1968 failed “revolution” called the Prague Spring, which ended when the Russians invaded to stop the reforms of Communism that were being instituted in Czechoslovakia. As a result of their complicity in the Prague Spring reforms, Dominika’s parents are consigned to low level jobs and constantly in danger of being denounced to the political authorities.
Dominika, born in 1975, slowly becomes aware over the course of her childhood of her parents’ political predicament, but she nevertheless remembers a mostly idyllic childhood enlivened by the resilient optimism of her father and the style and panache of her beautiful mother. Even when the family goes on vacation to Poland of all places and the car breaks down because some corrupt mechanic replaced the working engine with a defective one, Dominika and her parents manage to have a good and memorable holiday under ostensibly trying circumstances.
I think I’ll loan this book to Dancer Daughter(23) because of the Czech setting (she’s been to Slovakia a couple of times, too) and also because Dominika spends a lot of her childhood studying to become a dancer. The story of how she gets into a dance school that normally excludes the children of dissidents and only admits children whose parents have Communist Party connections is fascinating, and Dominika’s indomitable spirit is sure to charm the readers of her memoir.
The book ends in 1985 when Dominika was only ten years old. But it seems an appropriate place to stop. Dominika has been accepted to study at the State Conservatory in Prague. Her parents are still stuck in political limbo, but there is some stirring of hope for the future. Things are beginning to change, with the Solidarity movement in Poland and Mikhail Gorbachev‘s rise to power in the Soviet Union. In November-December 1989, The Velvet or Gentle Revolution restored democracy in Czechoslovakia. In 1993, Czechoslovakia became two separate nations, the Czech Republic and Slovakia.
From an adult looking back at childhood point of view, Dominika Dery sees things this way:
“This was the country of little cakes and sausages. This is the memory of my childhood. Driving back home in our old, rusty Skoda; my father’s big hands steering us safely through the night; the soft touch of my mother’s hand on my head. This was the happiest time in my life. The time when we had no money, no choice and no chance.
It would take me another eighteen years to realize that what we had back then was as much as anyone on earth would ever need.
We had each other, and plenty of love in our hearts.”
3. Some picture books for July 4th:
Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth. Paul Revere’s Ride.Illustrated by Ted Rand. Dutton, 1990.
Dalgliesh, Alice.The 4th of July Story. Alladin, 1995. (reprint edition)
Spier, Peter. The Star-Spangled Banner. Dragonfly Books, 1992.
Bates, Katharine Lee. America the Beautiful. Illustrated by Neil Waldman. Atheneum, 1993.
Devlin, Wende. Cranberry Summer.
St. George, Judith. The Journey of the One and Only Declaration of Independence.
Osornio, Catherine. The Declaration of Independence from A to Z. More picture books for Independence Day.
5. Stephen Foster was born on July 4, 1826. The PBS series American Experience has an episode on the life of Stephen Foster, author of songs such as Beautiful Dreamer and Oh! Susanna.
6. Thomas Jefferson and John Adams died on the same day, July 4, 1826, fifty years after adoption of the Declaration of Independence.
Adams’ last words were: “Thomas Jefferson still survives.”
Jefferson’s last words: “Is it the fourth?”
I highly recommend both David McCullough’s biography of John Adams and the PBS minseries based on McCullough’s book.
7. Calvin Coolidge was born on July 4, 1872. He is supposed to have said, “If you don’t say anything, you won’t be called on to repeat it,” and “I have never been hurt by anything I didn’t say.”
Also, “we do not need more intellectual power, we need more spiritual power. We do not need more of the things that are seen, we need more of the things that are unseen.”
Amen to that. More on Calvin Coolidge and the Fourth of July from A Quiet Simple Life.
8. You could make your own fireworks for the Fourth of July. Engineer Husband really used to do this when he was a young adolescent, and I can’t believe his parents let him. He tried to make nitroglycerine once, but he got scared and made his father take it outside and dispose of it! Maybe you should just read about how fireworks are made and then imagine making your own.
9. On July 4, 1970 Casey Kasem hosted “American Top 40” on radio for the first time. I cannot tell a lie; in high school I spent every Sunday afternoon listening to Casey Kasem count down the Top 40 hits of the week. Why not make up your own Top 40 All-American Hits List and play it on the fourth for your family?
14. Miracle at Philadelphia by Catherine Drinker Bowen. Subtitled “The Story of the Constitutional Convention May to September 1787,†this book is the one that gave me the story of the US constitution. It’s suitable for older readers, at least middle school age, but it’s historical writing at its best. I loved reading about Luther Martin of Maryland, whom Henry Adams described as “the notorious reprobate genius.†Elbridge Gerry of Massachusetts who wasâ€always satisfied to shoot an arrow without caring about the wound he caused.†(Both Gerry and Martin refused to sign the final version of the Constitution.) Of course, there were Madison, known as the Father of the Constitution, George Washington, who presided over the convention in which all present knew that they were creating a presidency for him to fill, and Ben Franklin, the old man and elder statesman who had to be carried to the convention in a sedan chair. Ms. Bowen’s book brings all these characters and more to life and gives the details of the deliberations of the constitutional convention in readable and interesting format.
15. Watch a movie. Getttysburg is a tragedy within the tragedy that was the Civil War, but it’s also patriotic and inspiring. Mr. Smith Goes to Washington has Jimmy Stewart demonstrating what’s wrong and what’s right about American government and politics.
I like 1776, the musical version of the making of the Declaration Of Independence, but it does have some mildly risque moments. Other patriotic movies.And a few more.
24. Listen to some marches by John Philip Sousa, performed by the U.S. Marine Band. I played several of these, not very well, on my flute when I was in Homer Anderson’s Bobcat Band.
35. Start an all-American read aloud, such as: Johnny Tremain by Esther Forbes. Eight Cousins by Louisa May Alcott. Guns for General Washington by Seymour Reit. Tolliver’s Secret by Esther Woods Brady.
39. We always attend the Fourth of July parade in Friendswood, Texas, except not this year since some of us will be traveling. Anyway, find a parade and take the kids or grandkids or neighbor kids. A Fourth of July parade is a celebration of American patriotism in a capsule.
43. Check out A Book of Americans by Rosemary and Stephen Vincent Benet. It’s a great book of poems about various famous Americans, and I think lots of kids would enjoy hearing it read aloud, maybe a poem a day in July.
45. Spend some time praying for our nation’s leaders: President Barack Obama, your senators, your representatives, the governor of your state, your state representatives, and others.
46. Wear red, white, and blue. Or put red and blue streaks in your hair. When I was in junior high, flag pins and ponchos were in style. I had a flag pin and a red, white, and blue poncho, both of which I wore together. I was stylin’!
48. Any of the following nonfiction books for children would make a good Fourth of July history lesson: The Story of the Boston Tea Party by R. Conrad Stein The Story of Lexington and Concord by R. Conrad Stein The Signers: The 56 Stories Behind the Declaration of Independence by Dennis Brindell Fradin The Story of the Declaration of Independence by Norman Richards The American Revolution (Landmark Books) by Bruce Jr Bliven The War for Independence: The Story of the American Revolution by Albert Marrin The Story of Valley Forge by R. Conrad Stein Traitor: The Case of Benedict Arnold by Jean Fritz The Story of the Battle of Yorktown by Anderson Miracle at Philadelphia by Catherine Drinker Bowen. The Story of the Constitution by Marilyn Prolman In Defense of Liberty: The Story of America’s Bill of Rights by Russell Freedman An American Plague: The True and Terrifying Story of the Yellow Fever Epidemic of 1793 by Jim Murphy George Washington and the Founding of a Nation by Albert Marrin The Story of Old Glory by Mayer
49. Host a block party or potluck dinner.
50. Take a picnic to the park.
51. Read 1776 by David McCullough or the two companion novels, Chains and Forge by Laurie Halse Anderson. All three would make great Fourth of July reads. Semicolon thoughts here.
55. Give thanks to the Lord of all nations for the United States of America, that He has made this country, sustained it, and blessed it. Pray that we will be a nation of people that honor Him.
This latest entry in the series about 11 year old Flavia deLuce, girl chemist and intrepid solver of mysteries, features a satisfying story and a surprising ending. These books should definitely be read in order:
The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie
The Weed that Strings the Hangman’s Bag
A Red Herring Without Mustard
I Am Half-Sick of Shadows
Speaking From Among the Bones
The Dead In Their Vaulted Arches (due out January, 2014)
However, I think I missed the fourth book somehow, and I still enjoyed this fifth one. In Speaking from Among the Bones, Flavia is determined to make her presence known when the authorities unearth the bones of Bishop Lacey’s resident saint, St. Tancred, who’s been dead for 500 years. But before the assembled company get to the bones of St. Tancred, there’s another, more modern, corpse to be disinterred. And Flavia is off on another investigation into chemistry and death in the 1950’s village near her ancestral home of Buckshaw where Flavia performs experiments in her great-uncle Tarquin DeLuce’s marvelous and well-stocked laboratory.
As the series continues, we realize more and more that our first impressions of Flavia’s family of her village friends, seen exclusively through Flavia’s own peculiar 11 year old filter, may not be entirely accurate. It’s a voyage of discovery, as Flavia realizes that perhaps her father has depths that are beyond her understanding and that perhaps her sisters Daffy and Feely do love her in their own ways, and that perhaps the other village people, both friends and enemies, are more multi-dimensional than she may have led us to believe initially. I really like this aspect of gradually opening up relationships and characters through the eyes of a very opinionated and somewhat precocious child. It’s a lovely way to show characters in all their messiness, especially with the added dimension of murder and mayhem to solve and resolve in each of the books.
Good series, and I was totally blindsided by the ending of this installment in the series–not the solution of the murder mystery, but rather an astonishing and unexpected development in Flavia’s own personal family life that sets us up for an interesting sixth book, due out in January 2014.
Children’s and Young Adult Fiction: Orleans by Sherri Smith. The Moon and More by Sarah Dessen. The Dragon’s Apprentice by James A. Owen. Book 5 in The Chronicles of the Geographica Imaginarium. I need to read Book 6, The Dragons of Winter, and be ready for Book 7, The First Dragon, due out in November.
“One benefit of Summer was that each day we had more light to read by.” ~Jeannette Walls, The Glass Castle
Welcome to the Saturday Review of Books at Semicolon. Here’s how it usually works. Find a book review on your blog posted sometime during the previous week. The review doesn’t have to be a formal sort of thing. You can link to your thoughts on a particular book, a few ideas inspired by reading the book, your evaluation, quotations, whatever.
Then on Friday night/Saturday, you post a link here at Semicolon in Mr. Linky to the specific post where you’ve written your book review. Don’t link to your main blog page because this kind of link makes it hard to find the book review, especially when people drop in later after you’ve added new content to your blog. In parentheses after your name, add the title of the book you’re reviewing. This addition will help people to find the reviews they’re most interested in reading.
After linking to your own reviews, you can spend as long as you want reading the reviews of other bloggers for the week and adding to your wishlist of books to read. That’s how my own TBR list has become completely unmanageable and the reason I can’t join any reading challenges. I have my own personal challenge that never ends.
I would like to bake Penny a cake. A fullness of time cake. Chocolate with chocolate frosting, rich and full. ~from Wilma Sue’s notebook
Wilma Sue has come from Miss Daylily’s Home for Children to live with retired missionary sisters, Naomi and Ruth Beedlemeyer. Her caseworker warns her, “Just one infraction and back you go to the orphanage.” Can Wilma Sue manage to behave herself, tame her imagination, and trust the sisters? Will the sisters trust her, or will they betray her trust and believe the lies that other people tell about Wilma Sue? And what is the secret ingredient that makes Ruth’s cakes that she bakes for all the neighbors, so very special—almost magical?
This middle grade novel pokes along rather slowly at first, but the pace picks up toward the middle. And there’s a slam-bang, suspenseful finish. Wilma Sue is an endearing character, as are the missionary sisters from Malawi with whom she comes to live. Ruth bakes special cakes for those who need an extra touch of grace or compassion or just plain neighborliness. Naomi stays busy volunteering at the homeless shelter and with various other charities. Wilma Sue’s job is to feed the chickens. As the story progresses, Wilma Sue forms a bond with these rather peculiar and unorthodox sisters, as she tries to figure out just what it is that makes the cakes that Ruth bakes so magical and what gives them healing properties.
There was something small and winsome and charming about this story. I became involved in the plight and the journey of Wilma Sue, almost in spite of myself, just as Wilma Sue is beguiled into the lives of the sisters. Oh, and Ruth sings hymns as she bakes her cakes. How could I resist?
From Joyce Magnin’s blog:“Children are still willing to believe in magic even though they know it’s not real. I hope that through the use of magic in my books children will also learn something about faith. Because what is faith but believing in things unseen.”
I am, by the way, a litle confused about the title of this book. I read it the way I have it in my post title: Love, Chickens and a Taste of Peculiar Cake. Amazon has it as Cake: Love, Chickens and a Taste of Peculiar. Ms. Magnin just calls the book “Cake” at her blog, so maybe Amazon is right. But I think I prefer my syntax, maybe.
Ms. Smith, who wrote the acclaimed historical fiction novel, Flygirl, enters the wold of dystopian fiction with her new (2013) novel, Orleans. The book is set in the future, sometime after the year 2025, after seven ferocious hurricanes have pounded the Gulf coast, after those hurricanes and Delta Fever, a deadly virus, have decimated the population, and after the United States has turned itself into two separate countries: the quarantined Delta Coast and the rest of the U.S., The Outer States, with a Wall in between and no travel between the two.
Fen de la Guerre is an OP (blood type O-positive). The people who are left in the Delta Coast, in the city of Orleans, live in tribal groups according to blood type, because the Delta Fever is somehow more deadly when it crosses blood type, or maybe because some blood types prey on others for transfusions that keep them alive for a while. (I never did quite follow the virus/blood type/transfusion connection.) Anyway, Fen’s tribe is attacked a bunch of AB’s, and Fen ends up with an orphaned baby that she has promised to somehow smuggle to a better life.
Enter Daniel, a scientist from the Outer States, who is working on a cure for Delta Fever. Unfortunately, he doesn’t have his cure quite perfected yet, and he needs to do research in Orleans itself, despite the dangers of life in the Delta Coast. Daniel and Fen meet, under less than ideal circumstances, as captives about to be drained of their blood by a group of kidnappers/blood sellers. They become allies and help each other escape, and so the story goes on. Will Daniel find a cure for Delta Fever? Will Fen be able to save the baby girl with whom she’s been entrusted? Will the perils of the Delta claim both of their lives before they can accomplish anything or even really trust each other?
The setting is a little bit like Paolo Bacigalupi’s Ship Breaker and The Drowned Cities, “a world destroyed and reconfigured by climate change and the greed of oil hungry corporations and industries.” But I don’t think Sherri Smith’s book is really derivative as much as coincidentally similar, and I really liked Orleans better than I did the award-winning Ship Breaker. I have to use the H-word in explanation and say that although it deserves the moniker “dystopian”, Orleans is ultimately just more hopeful than Bacigalupi’s series. And I do like a dose of hope.
However, don’t expect too much goodness and light in this mostly grim world of deadly disease and blood feuds. The ending is ambiguous, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see a sequel to Orleans someday, if the publishing gods and Ms. Smith see fit to continue the story. I’d give it a read if they did.
Recommended for fans of dystopian fiction and Southern fiction, especially if a combination of the two genres sounds good to you.
“Reading is a form of prayer; I know. Divine reading, lectio divina, is a way of communion with God in scripture, the Living Word. But is it wrong that I’ve had more profound experiences of God’s presence reading Anna Karenina, Middlemarch, Kristin Lavransdatter, and my children’s copies of Frog and Toad?”
Perhaps it is sex that has driven us mad. I think rather it must be boredom. We are so bored, we not only cannot be bothered to remember what our opponents say. We cannot be bothered to remember what we ourselves say.
Marriage, which has always been “unequal,” yoking together two very different kinds of bodies, must now be “equal,” measured only by the sincerity of one’s love and commitment. To insist on the importance of bodies is to challenge the sovereign self, to suggest that our ethical options are limited by something we did not choose.
There is one other consistent position that Christians can hold, though we will hold it at great social cost, at least for the foreseeable future: that bodies matter. Indeed, that both male and female bodies are of ultimate value and dignity—not a small thing given the continuing denigration of women around the world.”
“. . . abortion actually oppresses women. Procedurally what abortion requires is the silencing of a woman’s body and the unmitigated dismissing of her gender. We’ve accepted abortion as a right that celebrates a woman’s ownership of her body. But the procedure necessarily requires that a woman deny her gender by silencing and disallowing a natural and distinguishing result of womanhood. In every other facet of feminism, we celebrate a woman’s body, we honor her identity as a female. But abortion ignores her femininity . . .”
