“There’s no way of knowing exactly how many of Henrietta’s cells are alive today. One scientist estimates that if you could pile all HeLa cells ever grown onto a scale, they’d weigh more than 50 million metric tons — an inconceivable number, given that an individual cell weighs almost nothing.  Another scientist calcuated that if you could lay all HeLa cells ever grown end-to-end, they’d wrap around the Earth at least three times, spanning more than 350 million feet.  In her prime, Henrietta herself stood only a bit over five feet tall.”

Book Review:

Review by Eleanor Bukowksy  (DEC 21, 2010)

Rebecca Skloot’s The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks is an enthralling look at the origin of HeLa cells that grew “with [such] mythological intensity,” that they “seemed unstoppable.” They were a “continuously dividing line of cells all descended from one original sample” acquired from Henrietta Lacks, a black woman who suffered from a particularly virulent form of cervical cancer complicated by syphilis. During the Jim Crow era, many hospitals refused to treat black patients. Therefore, Lacks traveled twenty miles to Johns Hopkins, where black people were segregated in “colored wards.” After enduring heavy doses of radiation that charred her skin, Henrietta, who was thirty-one and the mother of five, died in agony. Neither she nor her family had any idea that the cells obtained from her cervix in 1951 would eventually number in the trillions and become a vital part of medical research all over the world.

Henrietta, who was one of ten children, was born in Virginia in 1920. She grew up in a “home-house,” a four-room log cabin that formerly served as slave quarters. She later married her cousin, David (known as Day). Neither Henrietta nor Day had much education. They spent their childhood planting and harvesting tobacco, milking cows, and feeding farm animals. One of their children, Elsie, had an undiagnosed mental condition that left her unable to speak. She was eventually sent to an overcrowded, poorly staffed, and unsanitary institution named Crownsville, where patients lived under horrific conditions and were subject to dangerous experiments. Henrietta and Day had few resources to cope with life’s tragedies and were at the mercy of an exploitative society.

The author expertly depicts Henrietta, her extended family and acquaintances, as well as various scientists and physicians who either knew Henrietta or worked with her cells after her death. In addition, Skloot traces the incredible odyssey of HeLa cells that “went up in the first space missions” and contributed to “the polio vaccine, chemotherapy, cloning, gene mapping, [and] in vitro fertilization.” HeLa cells also were instrumental in the development of drugs to treat such conditions as hemophilia and Parkinson’s. Rebecca decided to track down the family and find out how they felt about what had happened to Henrietta. At first, the Lackses wanted no part of her. They were bitter and angry over the racism and condescension that they had endured over the years and had no reason to trust anyone outside of their immediate circle. In addition, they suffered from a variety of serious ailments such as diabetes and prostate cancer, but had spotty health insurance coverage and little money to pay doctor bills. They received no profit from their mother’s unwitting donation to medical science.

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks touches on the history, sociology, science, and ethics of an era when the chasm between black and white, rich and poor, educated and unschooled, was very deep. Henrietta’s descendants express themselves eloquently. They are confused and incensed over what was taken from their mother without her knowledge or permission. Nor does Skloot skimp on the science; she explains how and why certain cells are more valuable than others. In addition, she discusses the legal and moral issues raised when someone takes tissue from a patient and then gives or sells it to researchers. Rebecca admits that “the Lackses challenged everything I thought I knew about faith, science, journalism, and race.”

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 413 readers
PUBLISHER:	Crown; First Edition edition (February 2, 2010)
REVIEWER:	Eleanor Bukowsky
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Rebecca Skloot
EXTRAS:	Reading Guide and Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	Another interesting book: Don’t Sleep There are Snakes by Daniel Everett

Bibliography:

• The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks (February 2010)

“I’m a little boy, he thought. I have travelled much too far away. My parents and the other people I lived with are dead. And yet they live. They are still closer to me than the man called Father and the woman who doesn’t dare come close enough for me to grab her. My journey has been much too long. I am in a desert I do not recognize, and the sounds that surround me are foreign.”

Book Review:

Review by Bonnie Brody  (DEC 15, 2010)

Sometimes we open a book and become totally immersed. We are enthralled. That’s how I felt while reading Daniel by Henning Mankell. Traditionally known for his Swedish mysteries in the Wallander series, Mankell travels far afield from his usual writing in Daniel. Here we are given the treasures of writing that examine the internal, the stuff of the heart and mind. It is a small book in size but it is huge in scope and packs a big wallop.

In the Kalahari Desert in 1878 live a group of Bushmen known as the San people. They are being raped and pillaged by the Colonialists who murder every one they can. When 9 year-old Molo’s family is killed, he is in hiding and manages to escape the rampage. He is eventually caught, however, by a Swedish man named Anderssen who puts him in a small cage and pulls him to the nearest settlement. There he is seen by Hans Bengler, a Swedish wannabe scientist, who trades something for him. Hans calls Molo “Daniel” and requires that Daniel call him “father.” Neither knows the other’s language. Daniel pines for his parents, Be and Kiko.

Bengler has traveled to Africa to collect insects and with the goal of finding an insect never catalogued before.  After he finds a beetle that he thinks has never been seen in Europe, he returns to his home in Sweden and brings Daniel with him. Daniel keeps trying to escape in order to get back to his home in the sand so Bengler resorts to tying him up at night.

The first part of the story is in the form of a long letter written by Bengler to a prostitute he used to visit regularly in Sweden. He tells Matilda of his adventures, of finding the beetle and finding Daniel. Bengler teaches Daniel to speak some Swedish and how to open and close doors with the appropriate etiquette. He also teaches him to bow and to say “My name is Daniel and I believe in God.” Naturally Daniel is not aware of what his words mean but he is supposed to say them to everyone he is introduced to. Bengler has some plans for Daniel but he has little money and all the plans fall through, including showing Daniel off in a circus.

Most Swedes in the nineteenth century have never seen a black boy before and Daniel is a new sight for them. Along with Bengler, Daniel goes through one sad set of affairs after another. Not knowing the culture, Daniel doesn’t know the basic things such as how to eat, where to urinate, how to dress. He’s never worn shoes before and hates the feel of them on his feet. He begins to pick up the language but attempts to remain mute. He listens and observes, trying not to speak.

The second part of the book is told from Daniel’s perspective. His culture becomes known to the reader as Daniel dreams about his parents and they give him advice and are with him emotionally. Daniel wants to join them again and to do this he thinks he must learn to walk on water so that he can return to Africa. He practices walking on water but can not master the task. He even asks a minister how Jesus managed to walk on water and is met with anger. Daniel finally realizes that he will never master this task and his heart sinks. He must find another way to return to his land.

During the course of Daniel’s struggles to return home, he is witness to atrocities committed by Bengler, sent to live with another family and has his life turned upside down multiple times. What keeps him sane are the memories of his family and their visits to him in his thoughts and dreams. He especially wants to return home to the sand so that he can finish a drawing of an antelope that has religious and mystical meaning for him. Daniel meets a young woman who is emotionally disturbed and the two of them decide to try and travel to Africa together.

Daniel of the Old Testament was a prophet, a captive, and received an education. In a metaphorical sense, Mankell’s Daniel meets these criteria. However, he never accepts his “new” home and does not advance in society as the biblical Daniel does. Mankell’s Daniel, even at the young age of 9 years old, is a person of deep roots and memory. He knows where his home is and where his bearings are.

This is a deep book, a book of journeys and pitfalls, but Daniel never gives up. No matter what he must face, he knows where he needs to go and what he must do to find himself and his home. Mankell, who lives part-time in Sweden and part-time in Mozambique, has created a small masterpiece and has shown his ability to change genres and create something new and wonderful. (Translated by Stephen T. Murray.)

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 9 readers
PUBLISHER:	New Press, The (November 9, 2010)
REVIEWER:	Bonnie Brody
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Henning Mankell
EXTRAS:	Reading Guide and Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	Read our review of: The Man from Beijing

Bibliography:

Kurt Wallander Series:

• Faceless Killers (1991;1997 in US)
• The Dogs of Riga (1992; 2001in US)
• The White Lioness (1993; 1998 in US)
• The Man Who Smiled (1994; 2005 in US)
• Sidetracked (1995; 1999 in US)
• The Fifth Woman (1996; 2000 in US)
• One Step Behind (1997; 2002 in US)
• Firewall (1998; 2002 in US)
• The Pyramid: The First Wallander Cases (1999; 2008 in US)
• The Troubled Man (2009; March 2011 in US)

Linda Wallander:

• Before the Frost (2002; 2005 in US)

Stand-alone:

• The Return of the Dancing Master (2000; 2004 in US)
• Depths (2004; April 2009 in US)
• Italian Shoes (2006; April 2008 in US)
• Kennedy’s Brain (2007; 2007 in US)
• The Man from Beijing (2007; February 2010 in US)
• Daniel (November 2010 in US)

Teen Read:

• Shadows in the Twilight (2008; April 2010 in US)

“Sometimes she sees her life as a series of set pieces rolling in and then out again, realistic enough to fool the camera but unable to withstand closer examination. Any inspection would reveal the flatness of everything, the false walls and painted-on doorknobs, the paper and paste in which everything is rendered. She would like to see it as the camera would see it. And so she keeps her distance. ”

Book Review:

Review by Poornima Apte  (DEC 14, 2010)

For the longest time, growing up in rural Virginia, Birdie Baker is convinced she is destined to follow the path set forth by her devout Christian parents. Like them, as a Jehovah’s Witness, she will spread the word of the Lord, marry, settle down and wrap it up. But the sense of unease that plagues her even after she is married to a church-going man named Judah, is worsened when she runs into her high school drama teacher at the grocery store. “What are you still doing here?” he asks, “I figured the next time I saw you it would be in a movie.” Eventually, leave Virgina she does. Birdie pools all her savings toward a one-way bus ticket to Los Angeles.

When the story first finds Birdie in LA, she is nearly 30 (although she is told to set her age as 26) and struggling to make it big. She does mainly “appendage work, a glorified crash test dummy” where parts of her body fill in for more famous actresses’. Her biggest break—if you can call it that—has been in a commercial for fabric softeners.

The wheels of success might be moving too slowly for Birdie’s satisfaction, but her devoted agent Redmond, promises her bigger and better things are just around the corner. “These things progress organically,” he points out. “Organically?” she says, “Are we farming? Do me a favor. Make it fast and artificial.”

Forever on the cusp of success, Birdie must schmooze at endless parties and try to make an impression. Word-of-mouth, after all, is big here in Hollywood. It is at one of these parties that she meets 21-year-old Lewis, another struggling actor who is even worse off than she is. Lewis works at one temp job after the other, hoping to land a job—any job in the movies.

Author Jenny Hollowell does a spectacular job here with her debut novel. Her prose is sparkling, crisp and edgy all the while moving the story relentlessly forward. There are heartbreaking moments in the novel—Lewis’ excitement at finding a job as an extra on a set and his subsequent letdown is a wonderful example.

In an interview at the end of the book, Hollowell explains that she sought to shine light on how as adults, we “struggle to navigate the disparity between our parents’ expectations of us and the life we imagine for ourselves.” She achieves this objective wonderfully. Birdie is endlessly racked with guilt at having left—at cutting loose the strings that once held her so strongly.

The city of Los Angeles too is a vibrant entity here. As she describes one Hollywood party, Hollowell writes: “The city lies supplicant beneath the party, its lights sparkling and winking as if it existed solely for the partygoers’ enchantment, just another lovely accessory that would be packed up along with the rented glassware and returned at the end of the night.” At the same time, not all is glitz and glamour in the city. She also wonderfully writes about the squalor of LA and sees how from a distance (the Hollywood Hills) even this chaos can be “transformed into something twinkling and lovely and benign.”

For all its despair and bleakness, Everything Lovely, Effortless, Safe has its share of cutting humor. This is not a book that is all doom and gloom.

There are many cinematic scenes in here and Birdie even instructs Lewis to imagine that life is just a series of scenes—it makes the disappointment more bearable, she says. In a movie she watches, Birdie describes the end “as it always is, a road leading into the unseen distance, implying both hope and hopelessness.” The same ending applies to Hollowell’s wonderful novel.

Told in brief chapters with absolutely readable, edgy prose, Everything Lovely, Effortless, Safe is a novel that deserves a wide audience. A character in the novel defines the word “lovely” as “beauty with a dimension of grace.” By that very definition, Jenny Hollowell’s novel is very, very lovely indeed.

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 8 readers
PUBLISHER:	Holt Paperbacks; First Edition edition (June 8, 2010)
REVIEWER:	Poormina Apte
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	Not Yet
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Jenny Hollowell
EXTRAS:	Excerpt and Q&A
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	Another to try: Our Tragic Universe by Scarlett Thomas

Bibliography:

• Everything Lovely, Effortless, Safe (June 2010)

“This is the kind of story the Jade Emperor himself enjoys hearing from me, one where the focus, indeed the whole point of the tale, is the grand heroic choice, the cinematic action. He is always telling me to hurry up, to cut out the needless detail, to do some editing and present him with the stripped-down version. But life is not like that. The fight to ensure the survival of love is more likely to find its toughest battles amid small snarls about changing nappies or midnight feedings or plain old boredom; it is more likely to focus on little betrayals or hurtful slips of the tongue, to feature the day-to-day heroism of pretending not to be aware of a thousand little annoying habits. In short, love is hard work, and the fairytale ending of our story is only the beginning of the hard work of keeping love alive.”

Book Review:

Review by Jill I. Shtulman  (DEC 7, 2010)

If this book doesn’t attain the high readership it deserves, there is no justice. It’s quite simply one of the most lavishly imagined, masterfully researched, exquisitely written contemporary novels I’ve read. And if that sounds as if I’m gushing…well, it’s probably because I am.

Under Fishbone Clouds is written by debut author Sam Meekings, who grew up near the south coast of England and currently resides in China. It is absolutely remarkable that the author is under 30; the book is full of gravitas and maturity that is normally the result of decades of living and writing. Interwoven seamlessly within this mesmerizing narrative is Chinese folklore and myths – absorbingly told – in addition to insights into Chinese distant and recent past history.

This novel is narrated by the Kitchen God, a common household deity who is challenged by the more powerful Jade Emperor to fathom the inner workings of the human heart. He chooses to follow a couple who, like him and his own mythical wife, were caught in the whirlwind of history: Jinyi and his wife Yuying. The tale begins in 1942 when the two fall in love, in spite of their different backgrounds and their arranged marriage, and continues to their doddering old age as the new millennium takes hold.

At the onset, Yuying follows her husband across war-torn China to her husband’s rustic and impoverished home. Bad times ensue, and when they eventually make their way back to the city, the Cultural Revolution has begun; everything now belongs to the state and all social strata are forced to undergo hard labor in the factories and the fields.

Although the Mao Cultural Revolution years have been well documented, Under Fishbone Clouds takes you up close and personal to these dehumanizing times; it is a rare reader who will not wince at the no-holds-barred look at a country whose rigid ideology trumps personal relationships and freedoms. Business owners, entrepreneurs, artists, teachers, intellectuals – all are labeled “bourgeois” and re-educated in the harshest possible ways. In a particularly harrowing scene, a man has a heart attack and is ordered to “crawl” to comfort and stop being a slacker. The depths to which Jinyi and Yuying are forced to descend to – separately, without each other’s comfort – is heartbreaking.

Yuying reflects, “Life isn’t meant for perfect things. I knew it when we were told to put making steel above common sense; I knew it when we were told to starve patriotically because the noble peasants had been huddling around homemade furnaces instead of growing food in the fields; I knew it when the whole country began to rise up to cut down the past. I felt in the pit of my stomach all the time; I just never knew what it was until now.”

Yet despite the intensity of the Cultural Revolution years, Under Fishbone Clouds is not a book about tragedy; at its heart (and a big heart it is), it’s a family saga about the universal and enduring power of love. There is sheer magic and lyricism in the love that Jinyi and Yuying share as they navigate answers that are often impenetrable.

And, Meekings suggests, by love we are transfigured. Jinyi realizes toward the end of his life: “Love also changes shape. It is no longer slim, lithe, nervous and sweaty palmed. It was no longer sleepless, heavy, a stone weighing deep within the chest. It was now warm, slow, soft, a tarry old blanket huddled under in the dark. It was the last embers of a promise made decades before, still glowing red though the flames had petered down.”

Using Jinyi as a catalyst, the Kitchen God comes to the realization that people don’t just carry on with their lives because they must; the secret of life is love, atonement, and retribution. He puzzles out the human heart as he follows this couple through all kinds of trials: deep anguish, death of children, famine and forced labor, class warfare, drastic social and culture changes, isolation and homelessness, the loss of dignity and health.

Under Fishbone Clouds is one of those rare books that I would confidently recommend to anybody: those with an interest in the history of the East, those who are enthralled with mythology and folklore, those who hold out for the best of prose, and those who are simply seeking an old-fashioned story where love prevails. I predict an amazing future for this very talented author.

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 8 readers
PUBLISHER:	Thomas Dunne Books; First Edition edition (December 7, 2010)
REVIEWER:	Jill I. Shtulman
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Living Scotsman interview with Sam Meekings
EXTRAS:	Reading Guide and Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	More novels based on Mao Cultural Revolution: A Dictionary of Maqiao by Han Shaogong Becoming Madam Mao by Anchee Min And a current novel that it can be compared to: The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet by David Mitchell

Bibliography:

• Under Fishbone Clouds (2009; December 2010 in US)

“Illanthe performed a random sweep over sections of the assembly arena, noting the various forms and shapes manifested across the shell wall. Over half retained a human appearance, whereas the rest had selected a multitude of geometries and colors from minimal spheres of light, to swarms of neuron echoes, to the simple yet sinister black pyramids of the radical Isolator Faction. … Of Gore Burnelli there was no sign, which perturbed her more than it should have. She still didn’t understand how he’d become the Third Dreamer; his mentality must have some private link out of ANA to the gaiafield that she didn’t comprehend. Not that it was going to matter now.”

Book Review:

Review by Ann Wilkes  (DEC 4, 2010)

In the final volume of Peter F. Hamilton’s Void trilogy, we once again find Edeard trying to make things right in Makkathran, his city on Querencia, a planet in the Void.

Outside of the Void, continuation of the entire galaxy hangs in the balance as an ark of humans travels to the Void in hopes of joining Edeard in what they believe will be an idyllic existence. The followers of Living Dream learned of Edeard and Makathran from the first Dreamer, Inigo, in The Dreaming Void, as Inigo shared his dreams of Edeard simultaneously across many worlds throughout the galaxy by means of his gaiamotes.

In The Evolutionary Void, we find out why Inigo refused to share the last dream and dropped out of sight, letting everyone think him dead. The Void is guarded by Raiel war ships and an impenetrable barrier. A Skylord, a gigantic flying being from the Void, invited the Second Dreamer Araminta to enter the Void in the last book, The Temporal Void. Her refusal set off an expansion of the Void, a warning of the greater expansion that will result if the barrier is breached.

Meanwhile, Ilanthe wants to use the Void to reset the galaxy to her specifications. She possesses technology that could seal off anyone who could stop her and hatches a plan to get to the Heart of the Void before Living Dream.

Every character is rich with imperfections, foibles and rare courage. Araminta’s resourcefulness, ingenuity and Silfen abilities keep her alive and out of the hands of Living Dream until she finds a way to turn the tables on them.

Aaron’s mind was so violated with devastating memories of torture that he has been imprinted with a second personality in order to carry out a mission which is only revealed to him by stages. His biononics and enrichments make him a deadly weapon. He doesn’t know who he once was or who is controlling him. He sets out kidnapping those he has been directed to collect. There is no reasoning with him or diverting him from his course.

Oscar Monroe, not long out of prison from the Starflyer War, and aided by the Knights Guardian, is looking for the Second Dreamer to keep her safe and free to make her own choice. But Araminta doesn’t know if she can trust him.

There is so much going on in this book it can’t possibly be contained in a review. And it can’t really be read without reading the first two books in the series. Hamilton doesn’t begin to catch readers up, instead plunging them right back into his story, which spans a galaxy with a cast of a hundred or so name-worthy characters. The Evolutionary Void is full of man — or woman — hunts, races against time, flights from enemies, fights with enemies, alliances formed or broken, mysteries, mind powers, aliens and cool tech.

Hamilton’s imagination and the scope of his Commonwealth Universe is the best I’ve read so far, and that includes Asimov’s Foundation series and Brin’s Uplift War. I’m just sorry the story is over. I hope he writes more stories in this incredible universe. I feel like I just lost a best friend now that it’s over. The Void trilogy could not possibly be told in fewer pages (each volume is more than 640 pages). They are well worth the investment.

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 41 readers
PUBLISHER:	Del Rey (August 24, 2010)
REVIEWER:	Ann Wilkes
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Peter F. Hamilton
EXTRAS:	Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	Read our review of: The Temporal Void

Bibliography:

Greg Mandel books:

• Mindstar Rising (1993)
• A Quantum Murder
• The Nano Flower

Night’s Dawn Trilogy

• The Reality Dysfunction (1996)
• The Neutronium Alchemist (1998)
• The Naked God (2000)

The Commonwealth Trilogy

• Misspent Youth (2002)
• Pandora’s Star (2004)
• Judas Unchained (2005)

The Void Trilogy (also in the Commonwealth)

• The Dreaming Void (2007; March 2008 US)
• The Temporal Void (2008; March 2009 US)
• The Evolutionary Void (August 2010)

Other Novels:

• The Web: Lightstorm (1998; 2005)
• Fallen Dragon (2002; December 2009 in US)

“The shape and feel of being fourteen—the taste of apple-flavoured bubblegum in his mouth, the humiliation of a spot on his chin, the unending turmoil of that endless struggle to stay afloat in a roiling sea of emotions, and the thousands of hours spent out on the gravel, determined to master an utterly valueless skill—the Frisbee, the yoyo, the Hacky Sack, the Boomerang—in the unshakeable belief that in this lay his salvation. Half of him battling to become visible, the other half just wanting to disappear. God, how had he ever endured it?”

Book Review:

Review by Poornima Apte  (NOV 23, 2010)

The Ireland that is the setting for Paul Murray’s delightful novel Skippy Dies, is not the one we have heard about recently in the news—crippled by debt and threatening to bring down the Euro. Instead, the novel is set in the not-so-distant past when the roaring Celtic Tiger was a prominent player on the world economic stage. Skippy Dies is set in an Ireland where the “past is considered dead weight—at best something to reel in tourists, at worst an embarrassment, an albatross, a raving, incontinent old relative that refuses to die.”

It is in this Ireland that the boys of Seabrook College, the primary characters in the novel, come of age. One of their frequent haunts away from school is Ed’s Doughnuts House, a franchise branch of an international food chain. And it is at Ed’s where, in the very first chapter of the book, Skippy dies.

By all indications, Skippy, a strong swimmer and average student showed no predisposition to a sudden and violent death. So what exactly happened that lead him to it? To find out, Murray takes us back to Seabrook and sets the stage. There are the boys of course—including Skippy’s genius roomie, Ruprecht (aka Von BlowJob), Dennis, a horny Italian kid Mario and a whole bunch of other colorful characters. What these kids don’t know is the fact of Skippy’s utter desolation—his mother is dying of cancer and Skippy’s father is thoroughly unequipped to help neither himself nor his son through the trying times that follow. It is this gap that Lorilei, a beauty at the neighboring girls’ school, St. Brigid’s, falls into when she becomes the object of Skippy’s affections.

Skippy’s relationship with Lori is doomed from the start but Murray also shows how the adults at Seabrook systematically ignore all kinds of early warnings—choosing instead to file Skippy into their own predetermined categories of weirdness.

The book loses some of its punch after Skippy actually dies—again, about three-fourths of the way in. Murray spends time chronicling its effects on many of the book’s characters, most of whom crash and burn in predictable ways.

Skippy Dies perfectly captures the teenagers’ voices—their banter is hilarious and pitch-perfect. Murray is simply flawless at capturing every shade of every teen moment. My worry is that he is so superb at this that most readers might assume that this is just another novel for and about teenagers and give it a skip (no pun intended). This would be a big mistake.

For not only is Skippy Dies a brilliant book about growing up, it also shines light superbly on just how long that process takes. One of the principal adults in the book is Howard Fallon, the history teacher, who is finding it hard to make sense of the direction his life has taken. Despite having a long-term steady relationship, he risks it all to have a fling with a substitute teacher. When she in turn leaves, Howard is desperate and without any moorings. He “expected life to be more of a narrative arc. A direction. A point. A sense that it’s not just a bunch of days piling up on top of each other,” he tells a colleague. In other words, it’s not just the kids who are trying to make sense of the world—the grownups aren’t quite done with the process yet.

By the time the book is done, the kids achieve a well-earned if shaky closure to their loss. They’re also slowly growing up trying to fit into a world that has already made them privy to many of its harsh realities.

As one of the kids points out: “You start secondary school, and suddenly everyone’s asking you about your career plans and your long-term goals, and by goals they don’t mean the kind you are planning to score in the FA Cup. Gradually the awful truth dawns on you: that Santa Claus was just the tip of the iceberg—that your future will not be the rollercoaster ride you’d imagined, that the world occupied by your parents, the world of washing the dishes, going to the dentist, weekend trips to the DIY superstore to buy floor-tiles, is actually what largely people mean when they speak of ‘life.’”

Skippy Dies superbly charts the adolescents’ slow realization that the world they see is the one they need to make the best of. As they do so, the many funny and delightful incidents that pepper the novel, together make for one awesome “narrative arc.”

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 39 readers
PUBLISHER:	Faber & Faber (August 31, 2010)
REVIEWER:	Poornima Apte
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Wikipedia page on Paul Murray
EXTRAS:	Reading Guide and Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	Other coming of age /loss of innocence novels: The Vanishing of Katharina Linden by Helen Grant Beautiful Malice by Rebecca James

Bibliography:

• An Evening of Long Goodbyes (2003)
• Skippy Dies (2008; August 2010 in US)

“For most people, Siberia is not the place itself but a figure of speech. In fashionable restaurants in New York and Los Angeles, Siberia is the section of less-desirable tables given to customers whom the maitre d’ does not especially like.”

Book Review:

Review by Poornima Apte  (NOV 10, 2010)

Hints of travel writer Ian Frazier’s latest project showed up in a recent issue of the New Yorker magazine, when an excerpt from Travels in Siberia was published. Having evocatively captured the spirit of a Native American reservation and the American Great Plains in earlier work, Frazier set his sights on a much grander level—he decided to travel across Siberia. A self-confessed lover of all things Russian, Frazier travels across Siberia despite warnings to the contrary.

The writing that makes up Frazier’s new book, Travels in Siberia, is based not just on one trip but many. He details paying preliminary visits to figure out a plan and later after an exhausting road trip that interestingly enough, ends on Sept. 11, 2001, he returns to revisit more historically significant places.

The reader can tell that Frazier has done exhaustive research and knows a lot about the place. The book is packed with historical facts including those about the Decembrists and later, about Stalin’s gulag. Frazier’s descriptions of the gulag along the Topolinskaya highway are extremely unsettling because they are pitch perfect.

Despite the pith that many historical facts add to the volume as a whole, sometimes these additions feel like overkill—it’s almost as if Frazier is trying to cram a little too much information into the pages. There are also entire sections devoted to the beauty of Siberian women, the writings of Russian authors, the fierce mosquitoes in the Siberian swamp, and more. After a while it feels like the book could have used some more editing.

At the same time, Travels in Siberia is full of funny and unusual situations. His companions on the first road trip across, Sergei and Volodya, set up an unreliable van for the journey, which breaks down at the most inconvenient times. Frazier’s details about waiting hours on end for a train connection at the Chernyshevsk station, is priceless. So too are the descriptions of the city of Veliki Ustyug and the steppe of Novosibirsk. Frazier’s beautiful ink drawings complement his narrative well. The sparse drawings effectively emphasize the starkness of the Siberian landscape.

The most hilarious episode in the book is a steam bath (banya) that Frazier is subjected to. His companions first “loosen” Frazier up by striking him with cut birch branches. Then big handfuls of raw honey (complete with bee legs and pieces in it) are applied. “I sat, honeyed and steaming for some time,” Frazier recalls about the banya. Sergei and Volodya then make him dive into a pool of ice-cold water. Frazier remembers seeing a slick of honey on the surface.

Not all is fun and lightness though. For instance, there’s plenty of environmental degradation around, a case made especially strongly in the city of Achinsk—where a lot of cement is made. “The thick, dusty air of Achinsk coats grass blades to death and desertifies everything in a wide radius around the city,” Frazier writes.

At one point in the trip, Frazier meets a university professor of mathematics who promises that Frazier’s journey is only going to get worse as it progresses. “Conditions will get even more stochastic than you have encountered so far,” the professor forecasts. And they do. There is plenty of excitement everywhere including in the diet—Frazier and his companions consume plenty of tvorog (cottage cheese) drenched with smetana (sour cream).

However the excitement is tempered by more-of-the-same in this travelogue. During his first pass across Siberia, especially since Sergei is not particularly interested in revisiting history or checking out the cities, every day and night seem to pass like the one previous. The trio comes across yet another town, settles down on the outskirts to camp and moves on.

So sprinkled among the humorous accounts and storytelling is plenty of monotony as well. This could be attributed to the landscape too. In a recent interview, Frazier pointed out what an old writer once said: “Monotony is the divinity of Russia.” In other words, all that endless solitude in wide-open land leads to its own kind of spirituality. Point taken.

As Frazier’s new work points out, Siberia is a land of endless surprises. There can be monotonous more-of-the-same for mile after mile and yet suddenly you can have a herd of cows attack your tent and supplies (this actually happens). Siberia has plenty of “stochastic” variables to be worked around. That might explain why it has an organization called the Ministry of Extraordinary Situations.

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 18 readers
PUBLISHER:	Farrar, Straus and Giroux; First Edition edition (October 12, 2010)
REVIEWER:	Poornima Apte
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Wikipedia page on Ian Frazier
EXTRAS:	Excerpt The New Yorker page on Ian Frazier’s writing
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	Some fiction set in Siberia: Sashenka by Simon Montefiore Petropolis by Anya Ulinich Far North by Marcel Theroux

Bibliography:

• Dating Your Mom (1986)
• Nobody Better, Better Than Nobody (1987)
• Great Plains (1989)
• Family (1994)
• Coyote v. Acme (1996)
• On the Rez (2000)
• The Fish’s Eye: Essays about Angling and the Outdoors (2002)
• Gone to New York: Adventures in the City (2005)
• Lamentations of the Father (2008)
• Travels in Siberia (October 2010)

“Where did the self-pity come from? The inordinate volume of it? By almost any standard, she led a luxurious life. She had all day every day to figure out some decent and satisfying way to live, and yet all she ever seemed to get for all her choices and all her freedom was more miserable. The autobiographer is almost forced to the conclusion that she pitied herself for being so free.”

Book Review:

Review by Betsey Van Horn  (NOV 07, 2010)

It’s been years since a novel’s impact was so colossal that I was unable to pick up and focus on another novel one, two, four–even twenty-four hours after closing the book. (The last time this happened to me was with Possession, by A.S. Byatt.) The force of Franzen’s characters, particularly Patty Berglund, pierced me with such legion intensity that I am temporarily ruined for the next book. I apologize for the lack of restraint in my accolades–that which is diametrically opposed to Franzen’s utterly fluid and immaculate prose, his graceful, poised restraint.

No contemporary author in recent memory eclipses Freedom‘s degree of character examinations. Patty and Walter are powerfully palpable, and to a lesser but still compelling degree their son, Joey, and their best friend, Richard Katz defy cliché. This novel hits its stride immediately, and continues to get better and better, and progresses to rare species. Not one dull page or false note. This is a siren of middle-class existential angst.

If you specifically detest novels of existential angst, OK, skip this. A fair warning. However, Franzen, in my estimation, does not toil or stall in the potential pitfalls of this theme and context. He has an exquisitely metered balance of scorn, mockery, truculence, and self-scorching–the traits that often dominate a domestic drama when the tone is ironic. There is nothing heavy-handed or phony here.

There are beautiful moments of self-awareness and growth. And this is where Franzen’s brilliance is doubly conveyed. I am not generally a fan of scatological humor, but there is an astonishing scene where Joey’s evolution is combined, and actually self-realized with the most fecal of matters. The metaphor of his personal excrement and the painfully comic scene amplifies Joey’s self-discovery. Only a pinhead would fail to see the mastery of this scene.

Some reviewers complain that he has no “tone.” Au contraire. As I posted in a comment earlier, the tone is sardonic–slightly more sardonic than The Corrections, and carries with it Franzen’s dry subtlety. Actually, it is the tone that conveys the lacerating narrative observation. You can hear the voice simultaneously wafting from an aerial position and a position of mock polarity. His minimalist but anchor-weight tone allows a vast breathing space for the characters to flex and develop without authorial intrusion.

The reader is also privy to the burgeoning effects of parenting on each generation; the parents are a mirror to the children. Franzen’s insight into what makes people tick and how he works that into each element of the story and the interlocking compartments of his characters is done with probity and humanity. The reader, for example, vividly understands the conflicting nature of Patty, because the verity and consistency of her inconsistencies has a foundation. Her flaws are not random. Additionally, the mammoth reflections and refractions between Patty, Walter, and Richard serve to enhance and heighten the tension and thrill of the narrative and events.

There is politics, but Franzen is an equal opportunity basher to all parties. He also reserves a special deliverance with fanatics and Kool-Aid drinkers. His specific love and propriety of endangered birds and nature and conservancy in general is advanced, but it is advanced with mindfulness. He leaves his organic footprint on a message, but he is a marksman at not using platitudes to do it. He doesn’t scatter diffuse homilies with ingratiating ownership; he is nuanced and wise.

The prose is squeaky clean without ever being sterile. His witty metaphors and euphemisms are an acid delight. Pour another page for me, please. The eponymous title alone is a wealth of metonyms. And there is a moral compass, despite what some reviewers, who have not read the (entire) book, say in their non-review reviews. The compass is initially foggy, for sure, and many miles of human error and weakness and Rubicons must be crossed. The heart is not irrevocable, in the story’s theme. It is a mighty muscle, a feisty organ, and has two-way valves. Franzen has written a formidable, epic, and unforgettable story of contemporary times. The hype has a genuine backbone.

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 533 readers
PUBLISHER:	Farrar, Straus and Giroux (August 31, 2010)
REVIEWER:	Betsey Van Horn
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Wikipedia page on Jonathan Franzen
EXTRAS:	Excerpt Oprah’s Reading Guide for Freedom
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	Read our review of: The Corrections and another review of Freedom

Bibliography:

• The Twenty-Seventh City (1988)
• Strong Motion (1992)
• The Corrections (October 2001)
• Freedom (August 2010)

Nonfiction:

• How to Be Alone : Essays (October 2002)
• The Discomfort Zone : A Personal History (September 2006)

About:

• Jonathan Franzen at the End of Postmodernism by Stephen J. Burn (February 2009)

“Memories were just photos printed on synapses. As such he justified sharing some of them with the world while keeping others locked in hidden albums. Yet as he’d poured the steaming water down his water bottle’s rubber nozzle, some queasy emotion made him shudder, splashing scalding water over his hand. Was there some law at work, some authority that required him to submit his memories of Fuwa to her as evidence?”

Book Review:

Review by Debbie Lee Wesselmann  (NOV 1, 2010)

In the snow-encrusted archipelago of St. Hauda’s Land, moth-winged bulls and a creature that can turn things white with her gaze share an island with more human lives: people who lose love as quickly as they gain it and who must struggle with the baggage of the past.

Midas Crook, a young and reclusive photographer who cannot stand to be touched, fights the legacy of his father within him. When he meets Ida, a strange woman hobbling around in huge boots, he accepts her oddity the way only another misfit can. Ida, it turns out, is searching for Henry Fuwa, the erstwhile love of Midas’s mother’s life, because she believes he may hold the key to her “condition” – a creeping glassiness that has already claimed her toes and feet. But Fuwa, a “recluse in a wilderness of recluses,” does not want to be found by anyone, let alone Ida, who knows some of his secrets.

This budding romance between Ida and Midas is haunted by the unspoken. Neither can speak of a possible tragic end to their feelings, and, because of this, their affection for each other acquires a stark, almost frozen beauty. They tread carefully, as though anything too overtly passionate will shatter the glass in Ida’s legs.

At first Midas wonders whether Ida “could understand the tangles of life here. The gossip chains more powerful than television. The snooping neighbors who could detect secrets like crows detecting carrion. Almost worse than that (because you could ignore people): the way the place regurgitated unwanted details.” One of these details, protected by Henry, lies submerged in a bog, and it holds the truth that no one dares to articulate. But, despite what Midas thinks at the beginning, people cannot be ignored, either. As he discovers his own connection to others, especially to Ida, he learns that the small strip of land where he has lived his life is no longer enough.

These stories involving others on St. Hauda’s Land take shape around Midas and Ida: Midas’s childhood and the tragic relationship between his parents; Carl’s unrequited love for Ida’s mother; Gustav and his daughter Denver’s loss of Catherine; Emiliana’s faith in her healing powers; the mysterious story of Saffron. All of these stories about lost love create a creeping sadness until one realizes that it’s not the loss that counts but rather the fact that one once had love, something that the characters cannot always accept.

The delight of this novel is not the story, per se, or even the characters, but rather the delicate way the novel unfolds in a place that seems both real and not. Shaw’s prose is nothing short of extraordinary, with phrases and images that make one want to linger over pages instead of rushing through to find out what happens. The impending sense of disaster is tempered by hopefulness, both in the characters and in the description. When Shaw writes, “Light was only of use as a metaphor for the ungraspable moment. Until there was a kind of camera invented that could return you entirely to a moment from your past, pictures such as those were no use,” we understand: here, the written word is more powerful and lasting than a photograph could ever be.

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 41 readers
PUBLISHER:	Henry Holt and Co.; 1 edition (January 5, 2010)
REVIEWER:	Debbie Lee Wesselmann
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Ali Shaw
EXTRAS:	Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	Another you might like: The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger

Bibliography:

• The Girl with the Glass Feet (January 2010)

“…The restoration of the old theater was so faithful that it hardly seemed possible her old friend was not still here. She thought if she turned, just so, she would see him standing center stage, winking at her during his bows as he had done the last time she saw him alive.

She sighed and tipped her head up to gaze past the soaring façade of four balconies to the sculpted trompe l’oeil ceiling with its splendid chandelier. There was a hidden passageway there, in the rafters of the theater, where compassionate Milanese had stowed Jews to save them from being sent to the internment camps. In 1943, the Allies had inadvertently bombed La Scala, smashing its roof and the upper levels to dust. Yet now it was restored to its glory, its history retained. The theater’s memory was even longer than Octavia’s.”

Book Review:

Review by Ann Wilkes  (OCT 31, 2010)

In spite of the bodice-ripper cover, Mozart’s Blood is not a romance. Unless of course by romance you mean a romantic age or setting. It is a vampire tale set in the world of opera and spans centuries. The details of the struggles, competition and fleeting rewards of being an opera singer create a very romantic backdrop indeed.

Marley’s heroine, the talented soprano Octavia Voss (as she is known in her present incarnation) is all business. Having been initiated together with Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart by the same vampire centuries before, she shares all his memories and understands his music better than anyone else. Opera is in her blood, if you’ll pardon the pun.

Octavia does have a companion. Ugo is neither brother nor lover, but is somehow closer than either. He keeps her safe and gives her injections so she doesn’t have to prowl the streets. In return he enjoys her voice and the opera. But she must never ask where he gets the liquid he injects into her vein. Ugo, a near-immortal himself, is kidnapped and tortured. But he will never betray those he has sworn to protect. Octavia, worried sick over the loss of Ugo and without a protector, must take matters into her own hands. The race is on to save Ugo and herself from a man whose ambition is leaving a trail of dead bodies in his wake.

Marley’s prose is beautifully woven with the right balance of inner and outer conflict, rich descriptions, suspense and action.

“He grasped one of the branches to pull himself to his feet. When he pushed out of his shelter, a little drift of white flowers showered his bare shoulders.

The rising sun had not yet burned away the morning mist. His feet brushed dew from the patchy grass. He looked about for some sort of habitation. The grove stretched into the fog, the ghostly shapes of the trees fading into the gray. Birds he couldn’t see twittered among the trees.

His head ached ferociously, and the sour aftertaste of wine, bitter with opium, clung to his tongue. Not knowing what else to do, Ughetto turned toward the morning sun and crept forward.”

Marley creates strong female characters without sacrificing their femininity. Her characters reach, grow and break through barriers created by others or themselves.

The many flashbacks of both Ugo and Octavia were most welcome, adding texture to the story and depth to the characters. Marley’s dedication to research of the time periods and places is obvious, but never distracting nor gratuitous.

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 18 readers
PUBLISHER:	Kensington (July 1, 2010)
REVIEWER:	Ann Wilkes
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Louise Marley
EXTRAS:	Reading Guide and Excerpt Ann’s interview with Louise Marley
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	More vampire novels: Cerulean Sins by Laurell K. Hamilton From Dead to Worse by Charlaine Harris Soulless by Gail Carringer

Bibliography:

• The Terrorists of Irustan (1999)
• The Glass Harmonica (1999)
• The Maquisarde (2004)
• The Child Goddess (2004)
• Singer in the Snow (2005)
• Absalom’s Mother and Other Stories (2007)
• The Singers of Nevya (2009) (Includes Sing the Light, Sing the Warmth and Receive the Gift)
• Mozart’s Blood (July 2010)

Writing as Toby Bishop, the Horsemistress Saga:

• Airs Beneath the Moon (2006)
• Airs and Graces (2007)
• Airs of Night and Sea (2009)