Mini Shopaholic

I would not be true to myself if I didn't review this extremely silly latest Shopaholic book by Sophie Kinsella. But now that I've begun, I realize - what does one actually say about a Shopaholic book? It's ridiculous, unrealistic, and, if you suspend disbelief and hang in there, it is guaranteed to make you giggle. This one has the usual elements: the awesome, highly successful but distracted husband, the impulsive shopping sprees, the rich friends, and the party of a lifetime. The "Mini" of the title is Minnie, the main character Rebecca's two-year-old daughter, also of course learning in every way to be a shopaholic. The book cleverly leaves at least two major unresolved issues, ensuring that I (and I assume legions like me) will watch out like a hawk for the next in the series. As a stress-buster or a beach read, Shopaholic is the best escape I can think of.

The Red Tent

My sister Carol lent me this book, saying it was her favourite book of all time, and thereby of course upping the ante on my reaction to it. But I loved it and stayed up till 3 a.m. one night to finish it. The book is based on a few lines in Genesis 34 which tell the story of Dinah (dee-na), the daughter of the patriarch Jacob and his first wife Leah. In the Bible this dramatic and terrible story of treachery is written almost entirely about the men who participated in it. The author of The Red Tent, Anita Diamant, re-imagines it from Dinah's perspective, within the framework of the women of the family.

Although I haven't studied that time period, the scholarship in the book seems fantastic to me. Diamant, according to her bio, isn't an academic, but I felt awed by the consistent and beautiful detail in the book and couldn't fathom the research it must have taken to figure out (or even imagine) this much about an ancient culture. The red tent is an actual place - a tent where all the women of Jacob's family go for three days each month when they have their period - and also a symbol of the sisterhood of the family which "covers" the women with great security throughout their lives. Dinah's biological mother is Leah, but she also considers Jacob's other three wives as her mothers, and the other women of the tribe are an intimate part of her life.

The women's subculture is the real theme of the book. It made me long for such a thing as well - it is partly there in my life with all my own aunties, sisters and cousins and now that I've moved away, with the women who have become my friends. But the geographic closeness of the tribe and especially the warmth and intimacy of the red tent create an unforgettable sense of what we may have lost in our mobile and farflung families.

I have certainly shied away from religious fiction - the evangelical versions of these stories I've encountered (and I may not have given enough of them a chance) seem impossibly mawkish to me. This book isn't. The Jewish author has no love for the patriarchs - the book doesn't reflect well on Jacob and his sons, who became the heads of the tribes of Israel - and the jury seems to be out on Yahweh as well, as one of many gods interwoven into the fabric of the story. The Red Tent made me re-think the tidy Bible stories of my childhood and the way in which the God in whom I believe was present in the lives of the Hebrew people, whose early culture was far from monotheistic.

A worthwhile and thought-provoking book.

Essex County

Essex County by Jeff Lemire is the first graphic novel I’ve ever read and I found it pretty interesting. The book was nominated by CBC’s Canada Reads as one of the 40 most important Canadian novels of the decade and was also one of the five Canada Reads novels for 2011. The author grew up in Essex County in southern Ontario.

Essex County is actually three interconnected novels, with some common characters in each. I kind of forgot this while I was reading and I think wasted some energy looking for connections that might or might not be there. It’s a surprisingly emotional read. The characters grab you, the drawings get you, and you really get involved in the relationships between the characters. Both plot and character development sneak up on you, since the medium allows minimal explanation and dialogue.

Being in the midst of making a cartoon book of my own, I was most intrigued with the drawing. Lemire has a scratchy black and white style, looking as though it was done with an old fountain pen that leaked or at least dispensed ink fairly randomly. While Lemire is sparse with faces and bodies, he is lavish with his use of panels – he often has a whole page or two of panels just showing a crow flying off a fencepost and into a night sky, or a page-size panel of the farmyard at sunset. I’m always looking for cartooning shortcuts, so while I didn’t always get the purpose of these dialogue-free graphic panels, I admired them for the sheer work they represent and the author’s willingness to stop and depict a mood rather than just rushing the plot along.

I loved the Canadiana – the farm, the small town, the people who don’t quite understand each other, don’t talk much, but still care, the one-bay garage and gas station, and the omni-present hockey story that ties it all together. It struck me a little bit like watching an old silent movie, except visually much quieter. Some of the dialogue, especially of the hockey players, is flat-out hilarious. I laughed out loud.

Incontinent on the Continent

I almost didn't review this book because of its terrible title, but I decided to do so because it actually is a pretty funny book. It's by Canadian travel writer Jane Christmas, who takes her elderly mother on what was supposed to be a six-week tour of Italy. Her hope is that they will bond and repair some of the difficulties and tensions in their relationship. They both love antiquities and architecture and the trip was meticulously planned around those interests. I really can't say much else without spoiling the fun. I will say that it ended up being a four and a half week-long holiday, and if you've had a lifelong yen to go to Italy, or an idea that you should take your parent on a trip, this book might cure you.

Bird Cloud

Annie Proulx won a Pulitzer Prize for her novel, The Shipping News, a book I didn't like that much but which nevertheless kept me somehow mesmerized. Her latest book, Bird Cloud, has many more of the elements I love in a good read.

It's the true story of a house she built in the high country of Wyoming - a finely crafted house incorporating everything she's learned about what she'd like in a house. Like W.B. Yeats, Proulx has a wonderful sense of place. She surrounds the story of the building of her house with stories of the houses she's lived in before, of what's happening in the natural landscape around the construction site, and especially what has happened there over the past millennia.

The book might drag for some near the end where she devotes a long chapter to the ornithology around her new home, but the writing is so gorgeous ("The extra pair of ravens came from nowhere, like black origami conjured from expert fingers")that it may keep you going even if you don't like birds that much.

I loved the architectural details of the house but kept feeling as though I was falling into a pit when feature after expensive feature of her meticulously planned house didn't work out as planned. For example, a beautiful tall window in her writing room that framed a huge old tree where eagles sat was suddenly framing nothing the year she moved in because the tree blew over in a windstorm.

It's a good read - Proulx is a master writer with wide-ranging interests. Her curiosity and unrelenting (I say unrelenting because there is something of the "bulldozer" in her) intelligence shine through every page. The great underlying question in the book is whether the house is actually going to work out and be the final home of which she had dreamed. I'm not telling - you'll have to read it if you'd like to know!

Iconoclast

This book by Gregory Berns is subtitled "a neuroscientist reveals how to think differently." Berns defines an iconoclast as a person who does something that others say can't be done. He illustrates his points with stories of iconoclasts ((95% of them men) like Ray Kroc, Walt Disney, Henry Ford, Picasso, Bill Gates, Florence Nighingale and Richard Branson. Do women just tend not to be iconoclasts? He never addresses the question.

His basic thesis is that what prevents people from thinking like iconoclasts is threefold: 1) perception - the brain is economical and so most likes to see and intepret things in their usual categories 2) fear - of failure, of mockery, most of all (according to one analyst) of not having enough money, and 3) lack of social intelligence. So a true iconoclast is willing/able to look at things differently, is not afraid to fail (or has more risk-taking genes) and has the social intelligence to convince others of his or her ideas. Berns points out that someone like Van Gogh was definitely an iconoclast, but a failed one because he lacked the social intelligence to spread his ideas. He died penniless and alone, in spite of the amazing body of original work that has gained him untold posthumous fame.

The book is a slog - it reads in places like a post-post doctoral neuroscientist's thesis (which it probably is) and at other times it just rambles. It reminded me of the Jane Jacobs book I reviewed a while back - two enormously intelligent, passionate and knowledgeable people that don't always "land the plane" - they go sailing off in this direction and that but don't always prove their points very satisfactorily. Probably both iconoclasts.

Berns doesn't really teach much about how to make your brain think differently. His key piece of advice for perception is to get yourself into new situations and see new things to jog your brain out of its accustomed patterns. The parts on how the brain processes fear fit in with a whole bunch of other things I'm looking at in my life right now, so in the end it was a worthwhile read.

Spirit '20

Our community concert last night was one of the best ever and there have been so many good ones. Spirit '20 is a six-piece Canadian classical jazz ensemble that formed only last year and is in the midst of what sounded like a modest tour. The group includes James Campbell, maybe the best clarinetist in the country, as well prodigious talent in the rest of the group - an incredible pianist, bassoonist, cellist, violinist, and trumpeter. There was no grandstanding - the group shared the stage equally and unobtrusively, obviously having a great time.

They play 1920s music, which I love, including in their program some lesser known composers but also plenty of favourites like Duke Ellington and George Gerschwin. The highlight of the program for me once again was Gerschwin's "Rhapsody in Blue," which had enchanted us at our October concert by pianist Sara Davis Buechner. Music is so good for the soul. I feel all buoyed up today by the joy of last night.