Tag Archives: Friendship
The Last Days of Ptolemy Grey by Walter Mosley
At 91, Ptolemy Grey is “waiting to finally be a man.” as he writes in his last letter, addressed to his young charge and heir Robyn. The novel begins backwards with an “Afterward” that summarizes the whole of Ptolemy’s nine-decades-plus, but to understand why he’s sitting there “with a pistol under the cushion and a gold doubloon on the kitchen table,” you’ll have to unravel the almost-300 pages (or eight hours if you’re listening) that follow.
Ptolemy has dementia. He lives alone in an apartment in Los Angeles so cluttered (filthy and bug-infested, too) that he can’t use his own bedroom, and even worse his own bathroom. His only regular human contact has been with his grandnephew Reggie who used to come take care of him. Now Reggie’s dead, gunned down on a friend’s front steps.
At Reggie’s funeral, Ptolemy meets 17-year-old Robyn, an orphan living with his niece, who shows up at his front door and offers her company and help. Suspicious at first, Ptolemy allows Robyn to clear the detritus from his apartment (not to mention his heart and soul). They quickly become inseparable, their unlikely relationship settling somewhere between parent and child, and impossible lovers.
When Ptolemy is offered a chance to take an experimental drug that will give him temporary clarity, he grabs the opportunity to finally make sense – and peace – with the ghosts of his frightened past: his mentor Coydog who was brutally murdered, his beloved wife Sensia who continually broke his heart, the neighborhood addict Melinda who demands his money, and finally, to find out what happened to his grandnephew Reggie. Ptolemy’s memories can’t be separated from almost a century of destructive, racially-charged history brought so sharply into focus so you can’t look away. Ptolemy’s reprieve is brief, but ignorance is no longer an option for the reader …
Confession: This is the first book by the prolific Walter Mosley that I’ve ever finished; I didn’t actually read it myself – narrator Dominic Hoffman conjured the story in his smooth, inviting voice. I admit to the possibility I might not have reached the end this time, either – Ptolemy’s sudden backroom access to the experimental drugs is not particularly convincing, Ptolemy’s hazy insistence he’s made a deal with the Devil seems tiresomely derivative, Reggie’s murderer is so obvious you really wonder why Ptolemy needs fatal hallucinogens to figure that out, and the just-on-the-edge-of-skeezy reminders of the relationship between Ptolemy and a teenager young enough to be his great-great(!!)-granddaughter gets to be a bit much.
But, finish I had to because Ptolemy Grey turned out to be part of a tremendously insightful look into Alzheimer’s. And getting on in years, I needed the education. [Thanks again to my poet friend, who is famous for her writings on her own mother’s battle with the debilitating illness, most notably her Dementia Blog.]
If you choose to partake (and well you should if the topic is of interest – or a necessity? – to you), here’s the recommended path: Start with Alice LaPlante’s unforgettable Turn of Mind, then get yourself to a screening of the spectacular film A Separation, then check out the NPR report about a skin cancer drug that is working wonders on mice with Alzheimer’s. Then, and only then, pick up The Last Days of Ptolemy Grey … sometimes, timing really is everything.
Readers: Adult
Published: 2010 Continue reading
Filed under ..Adult Readers, .Fiction, African American
Turn of Mind by Alice LaPlante
On the kitchen wall is taped a large sign: “My name is Dr. Jennifer White. I am sixty-four years old. I have dementia. My son, Mark, is twenty-nine. My daughter, Fiona, twenty-four. A caregiver, Magdalena, lives with me.”
What else should you know without telling you too much …?
Dr. White was a renowned surgeon before she retired. Her specialty was hands. She keeps a notebook in which she makes records of what she remembers; other family and friends also contribute to the pages. Her best friend and neighbor Amanda is dead; her body was found with four fingers from her right hand severed. Dr. White’s husband James is also dead; he lost control of the car when he had a heart attack. Her stock statement reads $2.56 million, but she’s not sure if that’s a lot of money: “AAPL, IBM, CVR, ASF, SFR. The secret language of money.”
And that covers about the first 15 pages. Can you shout “WOW”??!!
A seasoned journalist and creative writing instructor at Stanford, Alice LaPlante used words to deal with her own mother’s Alzheimer’s. In an article in the U.K.’s Guardian, LaPlante explains she tried non-fiction, journaling, a short story, before settling on writing a mystery – a genre she does not read – after an offhand remark her husband made while watching Sherlock Holmes.
What emerges is a first novel for which superlatives like ‘astonishing,’ ‘stupendous,’ ‘stunning,’ just don’t do it enough justice. Part mystery, part thriller, part family saga, part medical journal, Turn of Mind is a book you need to get right now and start reading (or listening – Jean Reed Bahle’s narration is expertly paced, her almost sly tone creating a smoothness just perfect for a most unreliable narrator). Don’t stop until that devastating final sentence: “In the end, that is enough.”
Tidbit: I came to Mind by way of a poet friend (with whom I share a hometown and middle school) famous for her writings on her own mother’s battle with Alzheimer’s, most notably her Dementia Blog. The day I reached the final page and finally exhaled, I happened to join a few of my hens for A Separation, one of the very best films I’ve seen in years. No spoilers: watch it to recognize the links. On that same day still, NPR shared a report that a skin cancer drug was working wonders on mice with Alzheimer’s. And that night, to keep my brain cells connected a bit longer … I started The Last Days of Ptolemy Grey by Walter Mosley (also at my poet’s behest), in which certain drugs make a grace-filled, havoc-ridden (both!) appearance. Surreal synchronicity: stay tuned …
Readers: Adult
Published: 2011 Continue reading
Filed under ...Absolute Favorites, ..Adult Readers, .Fiction, Nonethnic-specific
The Thief by Fuminori Nakamura, translated by Satoko Izumo and Stephen Coates
Handpicked by Nobel Laureate Kenzaburō Ōe for his eponymous Ōe Prize in 2009, Nakamura – who has also previously garnered many of Japan’s other top awards (Noma Literary New Face Prize, the coveted Akutagawa Prize) – makes his Stateside debut-in-translation.
Disguised as fast-paced, shock-fueled crime fiction, Thief resonates even more as a treatise on contemporary disconnect and paralyzing isolation. The protagonist – a virtuoso pickpocket with Robin Hood-tendencies – agrees to participate in what initially seems to be a simple robbery for a lucrative fee, only to get inescapably embroiled with the Tokyo crime world’s omnipotent power elite. Meanwhile, his last tenuous connection to society is a desperate young boy forced to clumsily shoplift by his addicted, prostitute mother. With nowhere left to run, the thief must barter his life with a labyrinthine test of his thieving prowess.
Verdict: Mystery/crime aficionados with exacting literary standards, as well as readers familiar with already-established-in-translation Japanese writers Miyuki Miyabe (Shadow Family), Natsuo Kirino (Out, Grotesque), and Keigo Higashino (Naoko, The Devotion of Suspect X), will especially enjoy discovering Nakamura.
Review: “Fiction,” Library Journal, February 15, 2012
Readers: Adult
Published: 2012 (United States) Continue reading
Filed under ..Adult Readers, .Fiction, .Translation, Japanese
Lovetorn by Kavita Daswani
Ah, this day of mislaid Hallmark hearts … meet Shalini who has had much of her future decided for her – a rather pleasant, happy one at that – by age 3. She’s lived all her life in the family compound in Bangalore, home to 37 family members spread over four generations. She’s been engaged to wonderful Vikram since she was 3, and he was 6. Thirteen years later, they remain a perfect couple, best friends who are committed and adoring, both inextricably linked to each other’s lives.
Now Shalini’s father has a new job in California and the family arrives for a two-year residency in what seems to be an alien world. Shalini’s father and her younger sister Sangita adjust almost effortlessly to the more-than-usual culture shock. In contrast, Shalini’s immersion into American high school life is painful and embarrassing (the resident mean girls actually drop a box of hair remover on Shalini’s desk!), made even more so for missing Vikram so much. Shalini’s mother suffers most of all, completely unable to adjust to an isolated new life away from the bustling family compound, and literally withdraws alone to her darkened room.
With help from Renuka, a new friend who seems to easily balance both her Indian and American cultures, Shalini soon begins to find her voice (and even manages to thank the queen bees for their depilatory efforts). Gingerly stepping into her new life bit by bit, Shalini’s young heart starts to beat faster than she’s ever experienced for her classmate Toby. What’s an engaged girl to do?
Ethnic chick-lit favorite Kavita Daswani offers another easy-breezy teen read with quite an interesting cultural twist of a 21st-century arranged marriage. Daswani gives a nod to her “cousin … in Bangalore, who … confirmed to me that girls like Shalini were real.” Certainly Daswani captures Shalini’s ‘stranger-in-a-strange-land’ experiences with heartfelt authenticity. Perhaps the less convincing depictions belong to Shalini’s mother – her depressions, her treatment, her failure to mother – and ultimately seem out of place with the rest of the otherwise engaging novel.
Tidbit: The back cover copy describes Lovetorn as a “Bollywood twist on a Sarah Dessen novel” which has me a bit befuddled, probably because I admit having never read a Dessen title. Google-ing didn’t turn up much insight to the comparison (the summaries of Dessen’s books on her website maybe suggest a vague similarity with Dessen’s The Truth about Forever?), so if anyone out there is a YA expert, do enlighten me!
Readers: Young Adult
Published: 2012 Continue reading
Voice of a Dream by Glaydah Namukasa
Nanfuka wants nothing more than to finish her education and become a nurse – the first in her village. While still a child herself, the teenager is suddenly forced to leave school and thrust into adult responsibilities when she is called home as her father dies from AIDS. With her mother missing, Nanfuka is now in charge of her four younger siblings, including a baby sister with AIDS who is clearly wasting away.
Her paternal Aunt Naka is only too ready to marry Nanfuka off to the highest bidder, send the other children away, and sell the family’s land. Her neighbors, too, seem to want to see Nanfuka fail, taunting her with her own dreams of accomplishment. Thankfully, Nanfuka has other allies, including Nurse Kina from school who offers encouraging solutions, and even the school lothario Sendi who changes his cowboy swagger and proves himself worthy of Nanfuka’s friendship.
With resilience, Nanfuka manages to maintain her independence while keeping her family together. The deus ex machina ending gives the story an almost fairytale unreality, although Nanfuka will surely continue to face future challenges in achieving her determined dream.
Ugandan writer Glaydah Namukasa won the Senior Award in the Macmillan Writer’s Prize for Africa in 2006 for Dream. Just 25 when her slim novel was chosen, Namukasa’s youth is clearly evident in her plain and blunt writing, although it also exhibits a naïve freshness. Her literary journey is certainly one to watch.
Tidbit: When U.K.-based international publishing mega-giant Macmillan closed its African operations in 2011 after paying £11.2M in fines over fraud, the annual Writer’s Prize for Africa, as well as other programs supporting African education and literature in East and West Africa, disappeared. With diminishing access and opportunities for African writers to connect with international audiences, organizations such as FEMRITE, the Uganda Women Writers’ Association to which writers like Namukasa belong, and honors such as The Caine Prize for African Writing, will hopefully continue to grow in prominence and reach.
Readers: Young Adult, Adult
Published: 2006 Continue reading
Filed under ..Adult Readers, ..Young Adult Readers, .Fiction, African
The Gemma Doyle Trilogy: A Great and Terrible Beauty, Rebel Angels, and The Sweet Far Thing by Libba Bray
Here’s a dilemma: If you knew how much a book series might deteriorate by its final title, would you read all the way through to the bitter end? As contrary as I am, I probably would … but I have to admit that in the case of this Gemma Doyle three-parter by mega-bestselling author Libba Bray, had I known that the first installment’s title ironically proves to be a fitting warning – A Great and Terrible Beauty, as in the series goes from great to downright terrible – I would definitely have moved on to better pages. And yet, almost 2000 pages (or 46 hours if you’ve gone audible), here I am …
Let’s start with ‘great.’ On her 16th birthday, Gemma Doyle, the daughter of an English family based in India, has a fight with her mother. She runs off into a Bombay market, then has a violent vision of her mother’s death – by her own hand – which proves to be true. The family abandons India, and Gemma is shipped off to Spence Academy outside London, where Gemma will learn “the necessary skills to become [one of] England’s future wives and mothers, hostesses and bearers of the Empire’s feminine traditions.” This is 1895 Victorian England, after all …
Initially an outcast, Gemma bonds soon enough with her mousy roommate Ann, alpha girl Felicity, and the ever-gorgeous Pippa. She discovers a quarter-century old diary of a former Spence girl which eventually lead the girls into other-world adventures in “the realms,” where they learn about the ancient Order and feel the looming threat of the evil – but missing – Circe. More often than not, Gemma finds herself fantasizing about handsome Kartik, who somehow shadowed her all the way from India, who’s part of a venerable all-male secret society charged with protecting the Order. Beauty turns out to be a big mystery, with lots of fantasy adventure, a bit of romance, enough literary allusions to make English teachers pat themselves on the back, and, of course, plenty of coming-of-age angst in a rather corseted society – think Victorian mean girls with a vengeance.
Then comes Rebel Angels, and the excitement of the new begins to tarnish. The girls’ otherworld adventures continue as they struggle with the responsibility of their new knowledge, although their biggest challenge seems to be curb their own shallow demands: Gemma wavers between strength and stupidity with an alarming regularity, Ann really needs to get a backbone, Felicity’s obsession with power fuels too many tantrums, and Pippa – who got stuck in the realms in Book 1 trying to escape a bad marriage – worries even more about her beauty now that she’s dead. Right. In between their catty fights, their family dysfunctions, and too many forays into self-indulgence, they do eventually manage to come face-to-face with Circe and finish her off. They hope.
Now brace yourself for ‘terrible’: Far Thing is over 800 pages of convoluted plotting – think insane asylum patients and debutantes, caped marauders, factory girls burnt to death, American Jews on and off the stage, talking trees, too many undead to count (including a certain Circe all washed up!), and so much more, whooo hoooo! The self-absorbed whining hits a fervent droning pitch; Ann’s self-pity, Felicity’s powerlust, Pippa’s histrionics are cringe-inducing enough, but Gemma’s sudden talent for making one moronic mistake after another renders her utterly unbelievable.
How such a memorable start can devolve to such simpering dribble is disappointment indeed. Most appalling throughout is realizing that these girls are either too stupid – or worse, that unfeeling– to bestow a moment of their selfish magic to save a little girl who is being incestuously abused by the monster guardian who did the same to his now teenage daughter.
Dwindling entertainment value aside, Bray wastes countless opportunities to explore issues of gender, sexuality, and rigid social class with any semblance of depth. She introduces such subjects as if showing off, but neglects responsible follow-through: quoting an abusive father’s dismissal of Oscar Wilde, for example, is a clever way to comment on the social mores of the time on homosexuality, but hardly enough when she finally reveals a tortured lesbian relationship.
Final word of advice: If you feel you must read the full series (sometimes we need to know what’s being peddled to our children), choose at least the audible version, expertly read by British ex-pat Josephine Bailey with just enough control and dignity to reign in her over-excitable Victorian charges … even as they turn into caricatures on the page, Bailey’s nuanced voice imbues them with a semblance of saving grace. Great and terrible indeed!
Readers: Young Adult
Published: 2003, 2006, 2007 Continue reading
Filed under ..Young Adult Readers, .Fiction, British, Nonethnic-specific
Waiting: A Novel of Uganda at War by Goretti Kyomuhendo, afterword by M.J. Daymond
Still a young teenager, Alinda knows only too well the potential horrors of war … and yet her immediate family has, thus far, managed to miraculously remain intact and relatively safe. In 1979, the reign of Idi Amin – the internationally infamous Ugandan despot responsible for the extermination of some half a million people – is nearly ended, and yet citizens are not safe from the continuing violence brought by terrorizing soldiers and wandering “Liberators.”
Even in their remote village, the gunshots are never far enough; every night, Alinda’s extended family and neighbors gather to sleep away from their homes, on the edge of the banana plantation. Everything of value has been buried in pits, hopefully a safe distance from their houses. In spite of the looming danger, Kaaka, the grandmotherly family servant, claims herself too old to bother to seek nightly safety. Then Alinda’s mother, heavily pregnant and about to give birth, refuses to go to the sleeping place, as well.
Day after day, night after night, the villagers wait. Bullets, then a landmine, too soon shatter the village peace. When the “Liberators” – relatively peaceful, yet very hungry – arrive in droves, Alinda’s brother becomes fascinated with the peripatetic heroes, while her best friend and younger sister can’t seem to stay away from their makeshift tents. Meanwhile the adults worry about their depleted granaries … and the growing uncertainty of all their futures.
Goretti Kyomuhendo is a multi-award winning novelist in her native Uganda. Waiting, her first title to be published in the U.S. (from the lauded academic indie publisher Feminist Press), is not so much a story well-told as it is a sensitive meditation particularly focused on the effects of conflict and war on women. As the oldest daughter, Alinda must think first about her caregiver duties over her desire to return to school. The single mother Nyinabarongo and her young daughter are throwaway cast-offs from her husband and his family. The never-named “Lendu woman,” whose husband often travels, is shunned as a foreigner and labelled a witch for her healing herbs. The many wives of Alinda’s Uncle Kembo – depending on his interchangeable religious affiliation – seem to be little more than equally interchangeable bedmates for convenience and comfort.
Kyomuhendo is unblinking in her characterizations of Ugandan women in crisis … and yet what is steadfastly imprinted by book’s end is the women’s determination to survive and even flourish in circumstances dire, tragic, and often unimaginable.
Readers: Young Adult, Adult
Published: 2007 (United States) Continue reading
Filed under ..Adult Readers, ..Young Adult Readers, .Fiction, African
The Wish Maker by Ali Sethi
I confess the main reason I finally plucked this debut novel (written by its author when he was just 23) from my never-shrinking ‘to-read’ pile was because I found the audible version is narrated by Indian American actor Firdous Bamji. After finishing Amitav Ghosh’s The Hungry Tide, I was missing Bamji’s transporting characterizations … alas, even Bamji couldn’t bring enough sparkle to the ultimately disappointing, overwritten family saga.
Wish Maker basically begins where it will end (don’t worry: no spoilers): narrator Zaki Shirazi arrives in his native Pakistan from his U.S. college in the first chapter to attend the wedding of his cousin-raised-as-his-sister Samar Api, the event which will mark the novel’s end. Over the 400-plus pages in between, we meet the many women – yes, the men are mostly absent – that shape and influence Zaki’s young life: his imperious, power-wielding conservative grandmother who is the family matriarch; his widowed, liberal, feminist mother often at odds with the matriarch; and, of course, his free-spirited, rule-defying cousin-sister Samar Api (who is, actually, Zaki’s father’s first cousin, the daughter of his grandmother’s younger sister, to be absolutely accurate).
Sethi gingerly overlays three generations of Pakistan’s tumultuous history – from its violent separation from East Pakistan-turned-Bangladesh to the controversial leadership of Benazir Bhutto to the country’s ongoing struggles toward democracy – with reminders of the unexpected influences of western pop culture (The Wonder Years!) and the closer-to-home fantasies created by Bollywood. Sethi is never overtly political except to allow Zaki’s mother an occasional anti-colonial diatribe, but he does remain keenly aware of the inequity of gender-based privilege throughout. Undoubtedly, the characterization of Samar Api’s mother remains the most memorable by story’s end.
I (again) confess that I don’t have any glaring, obvious reasons as to why Wish Maker eventually proved so lackadaisical a read (and listen); surely it seems to have had all the potential elements to be stupendous (including that 23-year-old wunderkind bravado!). But bottom line: at 432 hardcover pages or 11 hours in narration, such a time commitment is inevitably better spent with others … in Pakistan alone, Daniyal Mueenuddin, Kamila Shamsie, Mohammad Hanif, Mohsin Hamid, Bapsi Sidhwa all beckon with unforgettable tales.
Readers: Adult
Published: 2009 Continue reading
Filed under ..Adult Readers, .Fiction, Pakistani, Pakistani American
Little Rock Girl 1957: How a Photograph Changed the Fight for Integration by Shelley Tougas
Take a careful look at this book cover … no exaggeration that “a picture is worth a thousand words”!
The day is September 4, 1957 and 15-year-old Elizabeth Eckford is on her way to her first day at Little Rock Central High School. “Nine African-American teenagers, who would forever be known as the Little Rock Nine, were supposed to arrive at the all-white high school … and make history together.” Meanwhile, Hazel Bryan, a white teenager, walks behind Elizabeth, “… her face twisted with rage. ‘Go home, n****r!’ she screamed. ‘Go back to Africa!’” At that moment, Will Counts, a newspaper photographer for the Arkansas Democrat, clicked the photo and made American history.
Little Rock Girl is one of six titles thus far in the Captured History series from Compass Point Books, which “explores how a single moment captured on film can influence society and change the course of history.” Indeed, author Shelley Tougas uses the powerful photograph to tell the story of the brave Little Rock Nine students and their pivotal participation in the long fight for integration. Tougas devotes the first chapter to Eckford whose first-day experience was even more frightful because she did not get the message the night before about the fateful morning’s plans.
Four decades later in 1997, President Bill Clinton held open the front doors of Central High for the Little Rock Nine. Photographer Will Counts was also there. And so was Hazel Bryan Massery. Counts was able to take a very different photograph this time … one that would be used for a poster titled Reconciliation, now sold at the Visitor’s Center near the school. For the full story – inspiring and disturbing both! – and its aftermath, you’ll have to read the book.
Author Tougas effectively pulls together history, memories, and, of course, many photographs to present a mesmerizing, multi-layered mosaic of our challenging past. The title photo “told the story of segregation in an instant. But it did more than tell the facts – it provoked a reaction.” Change is still in motion … “and the state of America’s inner-city schools can be seen as evidence of racism in disguise.” Little Rock Girl, however, ends with the greatest hope, with a visit to Central High by one of the Little Rock Nine, Melba Pattillo Beals, who remembers being welcomed by a young African American boy: “‘Welcome to Central High School. I’m the president of the student body.’” Beals’ reaction is understandably tearful: “‘… I was expecting something other than this black child. This had been my dream, my vision. This was why I had endured all the pain and physical punishment – so this boy could stand there and say that. It was amazing.”
Readers: Middle Grade, Young Adult, Adult
Published: 2011 Continue reading
Schooled by Gordon Korman
Ever since the fabulous audible version of No More Dead Dogs kept my then-backseated young ‘uns highly entertained through many a traffic jam, Gordon Korman holds special favor on the contraptions that have taken over their now-teenage ears. [Pop, by the way, earned a double rave.] Oldster me is still laughing along (hey, these YA titles keep me young!) and especially appreciative of the full-cast productions that keep the running miles passing smoothly by.
Cap Anderson is just 13 when he’s arrested for driving without a license (even though he’s been at the wheel since he was 8), trying to get his grandmother Rain to the hospital. He’s eventually un-cuffed when the police officer realizes Cap’s not an unlawful teen, he’s just not your average kid. Cap’s spent his whole life on “an alternative farm commune” with Rain as his guardian/protector/teacher who’s homeschooled him “to avoid the low standards and cultural poison of a world that had lost its way.”
Now with Rain in the hospital with a broken hip, Cap gets thrust out in that “lost” world with no preparation. ‘Wide-eyed and innocent’ barely begins to describe young Cap who knows nothing of the “cultural poison” he’s about to experience. He lands in the home of a social worker and her angry-at-the-world high school daughter Sophie who has no qualms about letting Cap know he’s anything but welcome. Hardly home sweet home!
At Claverage Middle School (otherwise known as C Average Middle School after top bully Zach Powers pulls off a letter from the school sign), Cap quickly becomes the object of curious disdain. One by one, Korman shifts the narrative to give each of Cap’s new classmates a chance to share their reactions to the new kid. From the wannabe popular girl to the bottom-of-the-social-rung nerd to a football player who can’t seem to stop decking Cap (by mistake!), Cap’s brave new world turns upside down and all shook up. His classmates, of course, are in for some major surprises, too.
Korman effortlessly voices the worried parent, the proud principal, and the nastiest villain, to create a diverse community slowly coming to terms with unexpected difference. Cap’s otherworldly upbringing leads to moments of heartbreak and comedy, confusion and insight. Korman takes great care not to present Cap as some avenging angel against all things electronic and corporate, and instead imbues him (and his classmates) with unpredictable layers of complicated adolescence …
Readers: Middle Grade, Young Adult
Published: 2007 Continue reading
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