Recent Reading Archives

Vatican Bee Recent Reading Archives

January 2002

Stiffed by Susan Faludi: This is Susan Faludi's attempt to find the reason for what often seems to be an out-of-proportion response by men to the women's movement. Sensitive and thoughtful, this well-researched book is remarkable in its evenhanded examination of a current crisis facing male identity at the end of the twentieth century. Faludi's thesis is that men are now going through the same crisis that women faced in the 1950s; a growing sense of irrelevance and lack of purpose made more acute by the feeling that they had been promised then denied the keys to the kingdom. I peppered John with questions throughout my reading this book, and feel more aware of the problems contemporary men face in trying to make their places in the world.
Girl with a Pearl Earring by Tracy Chevalier: Spare, lovely writing creates a strong, believable character behind Vermeer's painting of a young girl with a pearl earring. After seeing two Vermeers in the National Gallery London, I appreciate the book even more.
Basket Case by Carl Hiaasen: Not his zaniest book; as a New York Times reviewer noted, the music industry is even wierder than Hiaasen. Still fun.
Reading and Writing: A Personal Memoir by V. S. Naipaul: At only 64 pages, this is an essay masquerading as a book. However, Naipaul's description of how he had to learn to navigate cultures that he had no mastery of and where he always felt on the outside, is deeply moving. The book demands multiple rereadings.
Death at the Priory by James Ruddick: A slight read about a sensational murder in London in 1870. Ruddick seems to feel that everyone knows the details of the case, and is in too much of a rush to reveal who he thinks 'dunnit' (and his own cleverness) to make this anything more than a trifle. Shame; the questions asked at the coroner's inquest destroyed more than one life, and I was very curious as to how the defense could have allowed certain lines of questioning to go on. It certainly warranted more than the curt treatment received. It wasn't as if the book went on, either, at only 200 pages, and most of the notes really should have been included in the body of the text.
Revolutionary Girl Utena: To Till (Volume One) by Chiho Saito and the Be-Papas: Translation of the manga commissioned by Animerica, and I'm not thrilled by the translation. Still, it's nice to know what's going on at a faster pace than my own painful translations can provide. Art is great, and the story is very wierd. Utena is a marvellous heroine, who is remarkable for her nobility of spirit, and complete individuality.
Ex Libris by Anne Fadiman: This is a wonderful collection of little essays on the joys of being a book person. John and I particularly enjoyed the first, where Fadiman describes how two people aren't really married until they merge their book collections; then the deep moral discussions and true compatibilities (or lack thereof) emerge. For anyone who deeply loves books, and everything to do with them.
The Golden Compass by Philip Pullman
: The first in a trilogy (His Dark Materials), this is superior children's literature. Pullman's world is dark and beautiful, where the people who take care of you are not necessarily the ones who are supposed to. Whoever told you life was fair? But you can do what you can to make it better.
The Subtle Knife: The second in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and just as gripping as the first. Very hard to do with a middle book.
The Amber Spyglass: The third in the trilogy. Some things you expect, and some you don't. I'm not sure that Pullman tied things up perfectly, but it's certainly done well enough that I'll be thinking about it for a while. I'm not sure when I'm going to give these to my niece, but I am sure that I will.

February 2002

Last month was a great month for reading. I managed to fit in nine books (alright, a few of them were very short), and they were all very enjoyable in their own ways. The only below average book was Death at the Priory, which I was glad to have read in proof.

Queen City Jazz by Kathleen Anne Goonan: An interesting turn on the trope of the outsider being the only one able to break the spell. Goonan's descriptions of her beautiful, dangerous, nanotech-animated city are vivid, and the confusion of her main character, who has grown up in a tech-less Shaker community, is effectively shared with the reader.
A Beautiful Mind by Sylvia Nasar: The book that inspired the movie, Nasar's Nash is a much more complex character than the movie is able to show. Nasar draws us effectively into Nash's world, interviewing past and current friends, acquaintances, and lovers. I greatly enjoyed her history of mathematics in the twentieth century, and her portraits of the vivid, brilliant men that inhabited it. A very egocentric and difficult man before his illness, I find Nash's change in character and his attempts after remission to connect with the people around him to be both sad and brave.
The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay by Michael Chabon: I was really looking forward to reading this book as well, and was not disappointed. Like Shuster and Siegel who created Superman, Joe Kavalier and Sammy Clay are two young men who have created a superhero, the Escapist, in a bid to fulfill their dreams. Joe dreams of saving his family from the Prague ghetto, while Sam just wants to escape. Chabon throws a lot into this long novel: golems, the Holocaust, the history of comic books, the Second World War, the history of New York, stage magic and escape, and closeted homosexuality. Really really good.
Searching for Paradise: A Grand Tour of the World's Unspoiled Islands by Thurston Clarke: For islomanes, a look at the lure of islands and the desperate search for just one island as yet unsullied by cruise ships and the rampant greed of developers. Why in the world would you go around the world to spend time at a resort to do the things you could do at home? Isn't the idea of travel going to see how other people live? Harder to make money from people with full package deals, I suspect. End of rant. Fun book, though.
The Bonesetter's Daughter by Amy Tan: Tan's books are always about daughters, mothers, blood, debt, love, and how long the reach of the past can be. This is no exception. In some ways, Tan's books always have the same basic arc, but the lives she creates are still rich and fascinating. A comfy, holiday read (which it was).
The Two Towers and The Return of the King: I'd reread The Fellowship of the Ring last year, but, inevitably inspired by watching Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings, I had to reread the next two. LotR has a timeless, archetypical purity about it that makes it, for good or ill, a true classic that will be rediscovered and read by my grandchildren's grandchildren.
E=MC2 by David Bodanis: Most of us have heard of E=MC2, but very few of us actually know what it means. Bodanis manages to take even the scientifically unsure reader confidently through the last four hundred years of scientific history to explain what exactly E=MC2 means, why it is important, and why the ramifications of those 5 simple characters have changed our world utterly. The most interesting part for me was the amazing range of utter characters that created the science we take for granted today. Bodanis gives equal time to the women, from my new heroine Emilie du Chatelet, to the seriously hard-done-by Lise Meitner (Otto Hahn was a completely undeserving SOB), and their stories were sources of surprise and pleasure. Recommended.

January 2002

February 2002

March 2002

Titles Finished

Manga Being Read

Scholarly Material Being Perused