The Creeps

The Creeps by John Connolly, 321 pages

"In this clever and quirky follow-up to The Gates and The Infernals , Samuel Johnson's life seems to have finally settled down--after all, he's still got the company of his faithful dachshund Boswell and his bumbling demon friend Nurd; he has foiled the dreaded forces of darkness not once but twice; and he's now dating the lovely Lucy Highmore. But things in the little English town of Biddlecombe rarely run smoothly for long. Shadows are gathering in the skies; a black heart of pure evil is bubbling with reven≥ and it rather looks as if the Multiverse is about to come to an end, starting with Biddlecombe. When a new toy shop's opening goes terrifyingly awry, Samuel must gather a ragtag band of dwarfs, policemen, and very polite monsters to face down the greatest threat the Multiverse has ever known, not to mention assorted vampires, a girl with an unnatural fondness for spiders, and highly flammable unfriendly elves." The last book in the series is my favorite, I think.  This book made me laugh out loud and I really liked the final wrap-up of the story. This was a great, humorous fantasy series.

The Dickens Mirror

TheDickens Mirror by Ilsa Bick, 566 pages

“Critically acclaimed author of The Ashes Trilogy, Ilsa J. Bick takes her new Dark Passages series to an alternative Victorian London where Emma Lindsay continues to wade through blurred realities now that she has lost everything: her way, her reality, her friends. In this London, Emma will find alternative versions of her friends from the White Space and even Arthur Conan Doyle. Emma Lindsay has nowhere to go. Her friends are dead. Eric and Casey are lost to the Dark Passages. Emma commands the cynosure, a device that allows for safe passage between the Many Worlds, to put her where she might find her friends again. But Emma wakes up in the body of Little Lizzie, all grown up. And in this alternative Victorian London, Elizabeth McDermott is mad. Elizabeth's physician, Dr. Kramer, has drugged her to allow Emma--who's blinked to this London before--to emerge as the dominant personality. Elizabeth is dying, and if Emma can't find a way out, everyone as they exist in this London will die with her.”  I’m not sure how much I liked this series.  Everything was just so weird.  I definitely liked the Ashes trilogy better.  However, I think that this could have some appeal to teen fantasy lovers, especially if they like darker fantasy.

Switch

Switch by Ingrid Law, 356 pages

“Gypsy Beaumont has always been a whirly-twirly free spirit, so as her thirteenth birthday approaches, she hopes to get a magical ability that will let her fly, or dance up to the stars. Instead, she wakes up on her birthday with blurry vision . . . and starts seeing flashes of the future and past. But when Momma and Poppa announce that her very un-magical, downright mean Grandma Pat has Alzheimer's and is going to move in with them, Gypsy's savvy--along with her family's--suddenly becomes its opposite. Now it's savvy mayhem as Gypsy starts freezing time, and no one could have predicted what would happen on their trip to bring Grandma Pat home . . . not even Gypsy.”  I think this may be my favorite book in the series.  I loved Gypsy and her determination.  This adventure story was perfect in the way it dealt with relationship and had the perfect balance of sweetness and humor.  I would highly recommend this to any kid who likes fantasy, adventure, or humor.

Mismeasure of Man

The Mismeasure of Man by Stephen Jay Gould, 424 pages

The Mismeasure of Man was first published in 1981, then expanded and republished in 1996 as a response to the scandalous success of The Bell Curve.  It is a testament to the strength of Gould's work that a book published thirteen years before The Bell Curve can plausibly be advertised as "The Definitive Refutation to the Arguments of The Bell Curve", and it helps that a major part of Gould's thesis is that the claim of some scientific basis for racial prejudice is one that recurs again and again over the course of the last two centuries.

The specific target of Gould's critique is the concept of intelligence as something measurable, heritable, and unchangeable.  More generally, he argues that the interpretive dimension of scientific inquiry renders it deeply vulnerable to the biases of its practitioners.  He begins with a history of attempts to quantify human intelligence (and, after Darwin, evolutionary progress) through physical measurements including craniometry and anthropometry.  He then describes the development of the modern regime of standardized IQ testing from its French roots to its American apostles.  Throughout, he demonstrates how the biases of generations of researchers manipulated and twisted the data - sometimes consciously but more often unconsciously - to fit their assumptions about race and intelligence, demanding that public policy be determined on the basis of "settled science" no matter how "unappetizing".

Gould is generally affable and entertaining, although he sometimes tries too hard - most readers will understand that the Spanish were not always honest in their relations with indigenous Americans without a rhetorical question about Pizarro's trustworthiness.  Still, given the often technical mathematical nature of the book, every attempt at humor is welcome even if it occasionally fails.

Self-confessedly, Gould had a political purpose in writing the book.  Because of that, he tends to pass over the progressive politics of many of his key subjects from the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, leaving the impression that their scientific racism was the product of atavistic, possibly unconscious, reactionary impulses.  This is somewhat ameliorated by a brief passage explaining the appeal of Lombrosian morphology to the post-Enlightenment progressive desire to radically restructure society along supposedly scientific lines, but the passage is easily lost after pages of insinuation which seem to suggest, for example, that Henry Goddard, one of the leading American proponents of eugenics, was a conservative elitist instead of a progressive technocrat concerned that the "unfit" must be managed lest they "clog the wheels of human progress."

There has not been another surge in scientific racism since the aftermath of the publication of The Bell Curve, at least outside of some fetid corners of the "Dark Enlightenment".  Perhaps it is only a matter of time.  But Gould's work raises other pressing questions as well.  To what extent can scientific objectivity, especially in the social sciences, be trusted and used to shape public policy?  How reliable are more recent attempts to explain intelligence through biology, or criminality through abnormal brain activity?  If it was Cyril Burt's work, now known to be fraudulent, that solidified the claims of psychology to be a "real science", where does the debunking leave the social sciences?  And given the ubiquity of standardized testing and our seemingly ever-increasing dependence upon it as a method of evaluating students and teachers, doesn't the conclusion that IQ is an illusion strike at the heart of the modern mythology of meritocracy?

A Few of the Girls

A Few of the Girls by Maeve Binchy.  319 pages.

This is a collection of stories by Maeve Binchy, an Irish author who has written many best-selling novels.  Generally, her books focus on people and their relationships with each other, and this collection, according to the publisher, " is a glorious collection of the very best of her writing, full of the warmth, charm, and humor that has always been essentially Maeve."

I have read, I think, all of Binchy's books, some of them several times over.  For the ones I like best, I like the characters, and reading my way through their relationships with each other.  I also enjoy how the stories aren't always full of happy endings; not every character is destined to wind up happy (at least by the end of the pages in the book).   These stories, published after Binchy died in 2012, are typical for her stories.   However, I didn't really enjoy them, overall.   I found too many of them were a bit melancholy, and even at times, bitter, for what I wanted to be reading.   In a book-length story, there is often more balance between the melancholy and the happy, but these stories were too short for that to happen.   The stories are realistic, which I liked, and were true in style to the author's books.   However, I guess I was looking for a bit more balance, and the stories felt like they were on the sadder side and after reading several of them, it got a bit depressing.

Stories from the Shadows: reflections of a street doctor

Stories from the Shadows: reflections of a street doctor by James J. O'Connell, MD.  184 pages.

This book is a collection essays and stories from Dr. O'Connell, who spent 30 years caring for homeless people in Boston.

This doctor is based in Boston, but I feel that the stories he shares here can be echoed by people who work with the homeless in many large cities.  O'Connell focuses less on the medical attention given to people, and more on the people, themselves, and their stories.  His essays range in time, so in one story, we might have someone in 1988 and another in 2001.  At times, I found I needed to put the book down and take a few moments to reflect and consider what I was reading.   This is a thoughtful book that I feel can provoke a number of emotional responses.

It's impressive to read about BHCHP (Boston Health Care for the Homeless Program) putting together not just dedicated services, but also an electronic medical system for homeless care to coordinate care and monitor quality measures across hospitals and clinics.

Choke Point

Choke Point by Ridley Pearson.  399 pages.  (Risk Agent, #2)

This story focuses on a foreign journalist who discovers an Amsterdam-based sweatshop that enslaves young girls as laborers.  A private security firm hires John Knox and Grace Chu as a team to dismantle the child labor operation and rescue the girls.  Along the way, they tangle with a crime organization, and it becomes unclear just who is good.

I enjoyed this book.  Reading it was like seeing a Jason Bourne movie: lots of action, with some quieter moments to tell the story. There is a definite sense of tension and urgency that permeates the story.

I appreciated that the characters felt complex, and none of them were perfect.  Some of the back-story, like the hints about training for how to know if someone is following you, was also pretty interesting.  Making Knox and Chu into a team made for a good mix; Knox has a lot of cultural knowledge and combat skills, and Chu is well versed in obtaining sensitive tech information.   With a lot of back-and-forth going on, as well as multiple perspectives, I found that if I put the book down for too long, I needed to go back slightly and re-orient myself.   So, with a book this fast-paced, it's easier to just set aside some time and read it through.  At least, that's my suggestion if this sounds like your kind of book.

Signs of the Holy One

Signs of the Holy One: Liturgy, Ritual, and Expression of the Sacred by Uwe Michael Lang of the Oratory, 155 pages

In this short book, Fr Lang attempts to compensate for what he perceives as an over concentration on the written text of the liturgy by focusing instead on the equally important "signs" involved in the liturgy.  He begins with a survey of twentieth century approaches to the sacred including Otto, Eliade, Bouyer, Rahner, and Ratzinger.  It is the last of these who, not surprisingly, has had the most influence on Lang, with his landmark work The Spirit of the Liturgy serving as a foundation for Signs of the Holy One and his "hermeneutic of continuity" informing Lang's entire approach to liturgical form and reform.

Lang's central concern is the incarnation of the sacred - in architecture, the visual arts, and music, but above all in liturgy.  He strongly distinguishes sacred art from religious art - the latter being the expression of an artist's religious experience, the former an expression of the understanding of the community.  Confusing the two endangers the connection between the liturgy and the congregation, as does the impression or experience of discontinuity. 

Signs of the Holy One has its shortcomings.  It is somewhat disappointing that his discussion of the liturgy and media focuses on television and almost entirely neglects new media.  It is even more disappointing that the book is so short, as the chapter on sacred architecture in particular only stimulates the appetite for more.  As an installment in an ongoing discussion, however, the book is invaluable.

What Catholics Believe

What Catholics Believe by Joseph Pieper and Heinz Raskop, translated by Christopher Huntington, 106 pages

What Catholics Believe presents a miniature catechism.  First published in 1939 in German and translated into English in 1951, it is a book designed to be read, unlike the didactic Baltimore Catechism and the 1992 reference book Catechism of the Catholic Church.  As with the latter work (and the 1570 Catechism of the Council of Trent) it begins with an exposition of the twelve articles of the Apostles' Creed and continues with a discussion of the seven sacraments, but where the official catechisms use the Ten Commandments to summarize "The Christian Life", Pieper and Raskop use the Four Cardinal and Three Theological Virtues as their framework, then conclude with short sections on Sacred Scripture and Church history.

A classic example of "what it says on the tin", What Catholics Believe is neither an apologetic nor a devotional work - neither Why Catholics Believe nor Reflections on Catholic Belief.  It simply presents the basic doctrines of the Church in a readily comprehensible manner.  This may frustrate or disappoint readers hoping for more "controversial" material, as if anything could be more shocking than the Creed.

Mind Over Bullies: A MOB Forms

Mind Over Bullies: A MOB Forms by D. K. Smith  336 pages

 I won this YA novel in a contest on Shelf Awareness (I just love that newsletter).  I’ve picked it up several times to start reading and put it down several times. I could never get past page 40.  Yet, there was something compelling about the story line that kept pulling me back. After reviewing some of the remarks on Goodreads and Amazon, I was determined to give read this book.

I didn’t buy the opening car chase scene that involved two teenagers as part of a larger counterfeiting ring where the police not only pursue them in a high-speed chase, but actually send a helicopter. Maybe it’s because I’m not a tween or teen, but to me it didn’t seem plausible.

There are several things I like about this novel:

• ·        Strong female protagonist and antagonists.
• ·        The main plot is bullying and the willingness to combat it.
• ·        The diversity of the characters.
• ·        It has GREAT bones.

The things I didn’t like are:

• ·        Too many plot lines. The one about Ellis in London should be deleted; it’s irrelevant and confuses the reader. I had to keep going back to figure out what that was going on with those characters. The plot line about the anti-aging drug/terrorism that comes up in the last third is confusing. The counterfeit ring and the bullying are enough. 
• ·        Too many characters that are not truly defined. Yes, Margo and Kat are distinguishable, but the rest all blur together. I can’t remember reading any physical descriptions about the characters that would set them apart. 
• ·        The cover is unappealing. 
• ·        I saw MOB and thought Mafia.

As I stated earlier, this book has GREAT bones. I think another re-write is in order if there is a second printing. The ending gives the allusion that this is the first book in a series. I believe that Smith’s writing will get better as he or she continues to write.

I give Mind Over Bullies: A MOB Forms 2 out of 5 stars.

A Fifty-Year Silence: Love, War, and a Ruined House in France.

 A Fifty-Year Silence: Love, War, and a Ruined House in France by Miranda Richmond Mouillot 288 pages

The cover and the title of Miranda Richmond Mouillot’s memoir intrigued me the most about reading, A Fifty-Year Silence: Love, War, and a Ruined House in France. A fifty-year silence sparked my imagination about what kind of silence it could be, was or how was it resolved, and what could have led to it in the first place. Would there be a happy ending?

Come to find out, Mouillot was as intrigued as I about the silence. The back cover explains that in 1948 Anna and Armand bought a house together in the South of France. Five years later, Anna leaves France for the United States, taking only their children and a typewriter. “Aside from one brief encounter, the two never saw or spoke to each other again, never remarried, and never revealed what had divided them forever.” This reader wanted to know what was so horrible that separated two people for the remainder of their lives.

Mouillot is very close to her grandmother, Anna, and semi-close to grandpa Armand. She can’t get their relationship out of her mind, and eventually goes to France to see the house the family still owns. She takes a leave of absence from her job and goes in quest of her grandparents’ marriage. She has a year to complete her task; a year to write a book about her grandparents’ lives. I never really understood what drove her to undertake this, but only that she wanted to write about it.

The house is a dilapidated, uninhabitable ruin. Yet, Mouillot is undeterred. She finds housing nearby and undertakes restoring what little is left. Her grandmother won’t talk on the phone, so the two write letters. Readers are given snippets of what appears to be long letters that sometimes make sense and sometimes don’t.

Mouillot has spent a considerable amount of time with her grandfather, especially when she was sent to a nearby boarding school. It’s unclear if Armand is living in France or Switzerland. But now that she is back, she tries to get him to talk about his life, yet Armand is reluctant.

There are so many unanswered questions. Like were Anna and Armand ever truly married. Or divorced?  In the five years they were together, most of that was spent apart as WWII raged across Europe. Armand was sent to a concentration camp, and survived; survived enough to become a translator during the Nuremberg Trials. The question of his citizenship is discussed, which I found strange. Surely he had to be a legal citizen in the county of birth.

What appealed to me about A Fifty-Year Silence: Love, War, and a Ruined House in France is two-fold. First, Mouillot tries to understand her grandparent’s relationship; a relationship hampered by survivor guilt. In my mind, she never unravels or gets to the heart of the couple’s revulsion to each other. That makes this work truly realistic. Second, the story is as equally about Mouillot. It’s about her relationship with her grandparents, which becomes quite tender when Armand begins to suffer from dementia. And it’s about her relationship with her past, a legacy of survivor guilt, and her attempts to move forward---a new generation ready, if not totally able, to forget the past and surge ahead.

I give A Fifty-Year Silence: Love, War, and a Ruined House in France 4 out of 5 stars.

I received this book from Blogging for Books in exchange for this review.

Havel

Havel: A Life by Michael Zantovsky, 517 pages

Vaclav Havel was born into a wealthy, culturally active Czech family in 1936.  After the Second World War, his family background resulted in him being actively discriminated against by the Communist government installed by the victorious Soviets, and the marginalized young man naturally gravitated to the bohemian scene in Bohemia.  A successful career as a playwright developed in tandem with a role as one of the most visible and eloquent dissidents in the Warsaw Pact, a role which repeatedly landed him in prison, but ultimately helped produce the Velvet Revolution by which the Czechoslovakian Communist regime was overthrown.  Reinventing himself as a politician as much out of necessity as choice, Havel became President of the newly free Czechoslovakia, only to have the country split into Czech and Slovak halves beneath him.

Biographer Zantovsky was Havel's friend and sometime spokesman, and his intimate knowledge of his subject is an important asset in dealing with such a complex, and sometimes contradictory, figure.  He does not conceal, although he does try to explain, his friend's shortcomings as a statesman and as a man.  Zantovsky's greatest revelation is the extent to which Havel's philosophy of "living in truth" was the result of his experience as a dissident, rather than the cause, as was his non-dogmatic experiential approach to that truth.  Indeed, in Zantovsky's telling, much of Havel's approach to politics was shaped, not so much by the hubris of the Communist regime, but by his own experiences of humiliation at the hands of that regime, both large and small.  Nothing shines through as clearly as Havel's humility - his awareness, based partially on bitter experience but also on a playwright's instincts, that nothing worthwhile could be accomplished alone.

February Totals!

Congrats to Jason S, who read the most books and pages and earned the most points in February! The winner of February's random drawing is Jen O -- we'll be contacting you shortly about your prize. Thanks for blogging!
 
February Stats:

Blogger	Books	Pages	Points
Jason S	22	5,018	28
Krista R	13	3,943	13
Jen O	11	3,510	11
Dennis M	13	3,187	14
Molly P	2	719	2
Julie E-C	2	576	2
Steve J	1	364	1
TOTALS	64	17,317	71

Planetary Omnibus

The Planetary Omnibus by Warren Ellis, 864 pages

This book was one of my table finds. By that I mean a patron left this on a table and I discovered it when picking up the books at the end of the day. Now normally I do not read many comic books. I read a fair number of graphic novels, and a large amount of manga, but something about comics never really hold my attention. I think this is likely because the hero nearly always wins and does so in an honest way. Seeing them do that over and over really takes away from what I look for in every book, believability. But something about this omnibus was different. There was a grittiness that made it enjoyable.


Until I read this book, I had never heard of the Planetary Group, or any of the super heroes that are featured. I like that most of them are the no nonsense, kill what gets in the way type. And to make it even better this is not the standard the earth is doomed story. Basically the Earth is rule by four people with extraordinary power. If they fight together no one can stand up to them. But Planetary is tired of being ruled, so they take the fight to them.

I enjoyed this omnibus, but then I have enjoyed nearly everything that Warren Ellis has written. I think if you also enjoy other graphic novels, or even comics by Ellis, then you will enjoy this as well.

People in the Trees

People in the Trees by Hanya Yanagihara, 496 pages

This is another one of those books that I never would have read if not for the book group. Once again it is just not my genre. People in the Trees is a fiction book with a large dose of science. The entire story is presented as an autobiography of Norton Perina, a doctor who helped discovered an isolated tribe of people who seem to have discovered immortality. The secret lies in a rare species of turtles that are only found on that island, and are treated reverently. 


This book starts off with two strikes against it. In the opening pages Dr. Perina is charged, tried and convicted of child molestation and we find out that all of the turtles are dead. If the story had been overly dull I think I would have given up on this book, but luckily it was at least mostly interesting. Since this book was written as an autobiography, complete with made up footnotes, I at times forgot that this was in fact fiction. I even went as far as Googling some of the articles mentioned.

The Porcupine Of Truth

The Porcupine Of Truth by Bill Konigsberg, 325 pages

Carson is spending the summer in Billings, MT to be with his dying dad who he hasn’t seen since he was three.  Carson and his mom live in New York City and his mom left his alcoholic dad but is back to take care of him.  Billings is nothing like New York and Carson is sure that it will be the worst summer ever until he meets Aisha.  Aisha is hot, but she’s also an African-American lesbian who’s been kicked out of her home by her Christian dad.  Carson and Aisha manage to find a way to have an epic adventure and learn a few things along the way.  This was an awesome book that I think a lot of teens would like.

A Song For Ella Grey

A Song For Ella Grey by David Almond, 268 pages

This book is a modern day retelling of the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice.  Orpheus is still Orpheus but Eurydice is Ella.  The story is told from the point of view of Ella’s best friend, Claire.  They are in the senior year of high school when Claire and her friends meet Orpheus, who makes music that is out of this world.  They forget themselves, the birds stop singing, the wildlife sits and listens, the wind stops blowing.  But Orpheus falls in love with Ella.  Anyone who has read the myth knows how the story ends, basically, but it is well written and the characters are very real.  A great teen read.

How To Flirt With A Naked Werewolf

HowTo Flirt With A Naked Werewolf by Molly Harper, 371 pages

“Even in Grundy, Alaska, it's unusual to find a naked guy with a bear trap clamped to his ankle on your porch. But when said guy turns into a wolf, recent southern transplant Mo Wenstein has no difficulty identifying the problem. Her surly neighbor Cooper Graham--who has been openly critical of Mo's ability to adapt to life in Alaska--has trouble of his own. Werewolf trouble.  For Cooper, an Alpha in self-imposed exile from his dysfunctional pack, it's love at first sniff when it comes to Mo. But Cooper has an even more pressing concern on his mind. Several people around Grundy have been the victims of wolf attacks, and since Cooper has no memory of what he gets up to while in werewolf form, he's worried that he might be the violent canine in question.  If a wolf cries wolf, it makes sense to listen, yet Mo is convinced that Cooper is not the culprit. Except if he's not responsible, then who is? And when a werewolf falls head over haunches in love with you, what are you supposed to do anyway? The rules of dating just got a whole lot more complicated. . .”  I really enjoyed the humor and romance.  People who like the supernatural romances will want to check this out.

Beside Myself

Beside Myself by Ann Morgan.  313 pages.

This is a literary psychological thriller about two identical twins, Helen and Ellie, who swap places when they are six years old.  At first, it's a fun game, but when Ellie refuses to swap back, Helen is thrown into a lifelong tailspin.   As their lives sharply veer apart, it's uncertain if the truth will ever be revealed, and at what cost.

I found this book to be disturbing, very much so at times, and yet couldn't stop turning the pages.  I hadn't planned to sit down with it on a Sunday afternoon and read it all, but I just kept gulping down the pages.   You get the story from Helen's viewpoint, which at times becomes skewed, as it becomes apparent that she is suffering from mental illness.   When the twins swap identities for one day, it shouldn't be a big deal.  However, Helen is the favored child, the one who does well in school and whose behavior is always good.   Ellie, the daughter who seems troubled, and always a bit of a mess, obviously relishes the opportunity to play Helen for the day.  When Ellie refuses to reveal their swap to their mother, and their mother (awfully) can't tell the difference between them, Helen is thrown off track.  No one will believe her that she's the real Helen, and Ellie is starting to do such a convincing Helen impression that there's no going back.  Over the years, Helen (called Smudge when we begin the story, with her as an adult reflecting back) unravels, spiraling into dangerous, self-harming behavior as Ellie (or "Hellie" as Helen calls her) seems to be on a successful path.  

However, when Ellie has an accident and lapses into a coma, Helen finally is able to confront the awful truth of what happened.   However, it's unclear if this will really help anything.

I found Helen to be a very compelling character, even though I would read and cringe at the same time.  She gets caught up in an awful kind of life, and her mother is an absolute monster.  As the story progressed, I couldn't be sure what was going to happen next, but I liked that.   The book was strange, and disturbing . . . but I couldn't look away.   Is it a book for everyone?  Definitely not.  But if you're looking for a different kind of psychological thriller, with a potentially unreliable narrator, this is your kind of story.

Witch & Wizard

Witch & Wizard: the manga Vol. 1-3 by James Patterson, 751 pages (3 books)

 

Witch and Wizard, the manga, is about two kids named Wisty and Whit who thought they were like all of the other kids until government agents break into their home and arrest them and their parents. The charges witchcraft. Now this is not one of those time were people are wrongly accused, they certainly can do magic but why that is illegal is very suspect. Separated from their parents, Wisty and Whit must learn to control their magic and escape, after all it seems the world is relying on them.

So I originally thought all three books in this series were all adapted pieces of the source novel Witch and Wizard. Having never read the actual book, this delusion continued right up until I started researching this series to write this post. It turns out that each manga book is based off a book in the novel series. The first follows Witch and Wizard, the second was based off of The Gift, and the last “completed” the series with The Fire. Patterson has two more book in the novel series, though I cannot find anything that says these will be adapted. I find this directly correlated manga to be quite strange. Typically when a book is adapted into this format it becomes several volumes. I have to wonder how much of the storyline was cut out for a one to one adaptation.