If you buy thebook, make sure you get the one with the green cover, the photo edition. Released in 2022, it’s the newest edition.
Why did I buy this book?
This book was recommended by Gwen, the manager of Drury Lane Books in Grand Marais, Minnesota, one of my favorite bookstores. (Although, I have to say any independent bookstore I go into becomes one of my favorites! And, once I’m inside a bookstore, I don’t like to leave.)
What is this book about?
Backyard Almanac: 365 Days of Northern Nature covers plants, insects, and animals that can be found in northern Minnesota and northern Wisconsin. One day and one page at a time, readers can learn about birds, butterflies, mosses, mushrooms, berries, wild flowers, amphibians, and trees, among other amazing plants and creatures.
What do I love about this book?
I started reading this book on October 10 because that is when I bought it. I read one page a day, so today I will read the entry for November 6, titled “Jiggly Jelly Fungi of Fall.” I love that I can read about nature one page a day, and it only takes a few minutes. It satisfies my urge to learn about the natural world around me, and it leaves me with time to read other books.
Each page is beautifully laid out. Larry Weber writes clear, concise descriptions with interesting details about each plant, insect, or animal. Photographer Sparky Stensaas provides beautiful photographs and informative captions. And illustrator Judy Gibbs’s enchanting sketches grace every page. It’s fascinating how much life can be found on the forest floor, in low-growing vegetation, and in trees if a person knows where to look.
At the end of each month’s section, is a blank page where a person can record notes about nature. An index at the back of the book makes it easy to look up entries. Because of the book’s thick, glossy, high-quality paper, the photographs are sharp with great color reproduction. Also, the book is heavy — good for doing some arm-toning reps, which I actually do if no one is watching.
What makes this book important?
The more people understand about nature and its interconnectedness, the more they will respect and treasure all of its plants, insects, and animals.
Doubleday, a division of Penguin Random House, 2023
Why did I read this book?
I read a lot of novels; short stories; and nonfiction about history, people, and nature. But every now and then, I love a good book about a real shipwreck. (I’ve read at least nine over the years.) True stories about tumultuous weather, dangerous waterways, towering icebergs, or deadly torpedoes that cause a ship to falter upon rocky coastlines or to sink into dark, deep oceans keep me reading late into the night. Stranded sailors, whether they be in a lifeboat or marooned on uninhabited and untamed land, appeal to me. Both dastardly and brave deeds among the captains, officers, crew, and passengers pull me into a world of drowning, scurvy, starvation, dehydration, desperation, intrigue, cruelty, selflessness, fortitude, and perseverance. I’m not sure why I enjoy these stories so much — or what this says about me.
What is this book about?
In 1740, the Wager, a British ship, left England on a secret mission to seize a Spanish galleon loaded with treasure. Britain and Spain were at war, and wars are expensive. By capturing the Spanish treasure, Britain could fill its war chest while depleting Spain’s. British officers and sailors alike knew this was a dangerous mission.
In pursuit of its quest, the Wager sailed around the tip of South America, perhaps the most perilous stretch of water in the world, then wrecked itself on a deserted island off the coast of Patagonia. The men were able to salvage supplies from the wrecked ship, but they were stranded for months. As the threat of starvation grew, the men decided to build a makeshift watercraft and leave the island. They sailed back to safety and were welcomed home as heroes. However, six months later three more of the stranded sailors returned home, and they accused the first group of sailors of mutiny. Accusations of rebellion, murder, and treachery between the first and second groups of survivors resulted in an investigation followed by a court martial.
What makes this book so good?
David Grann writes a highly engaging and well-researched history about a risky sea mission driven by greed and glory that goes awry. Almost three hundred years later, Grann was able to access the ship’s logs and the transcripts from the ensuing court martial.
A captain and other officers aboard a ship were expected to keep meticulous records. When a ship returned to port in England, all logs were turned over to the Admiralty, who used the information to learn more about weather patterns, sailing routes, and faraway lands. Additionally, if something went wrong aboard a ship, the events and the measures taken to remedy the calamity were to be objectively and completely documented. Logs kept by officers and mates were supposed to be detailed and succinct without emotional slants. However, as things worsened on the Wager‘s journey and after its wreck, it became clear that each officer who kept a log recorded the events in a manner to put himself and his actions in the best light. As to which accounts might be accurate and which might be embellished, Grann smartly doesn’t take sides but simply presents the information.
Grann’s vivid descriptions of bad weather, inhospitable lands, and tempestuous seas recreate the backdrop in which the egotistical, short-tempered, avaricious officers strived to chase down the treasure-filled Spanish galleon that would have made them wealthy and famous.
It’s a rollicking read filled with courage, double-dealing, and foolishness. For 257 pages, I joined the adventure from the safety of my couch, and wondered, Why — before modern ships and navigational equipment — did anyone ever leave the shores of their homeland, especially for a voyage around the tip of South America that had only a slim chance of success? And perhaps that’s what draws me to books about shipwrecks: A group of people get on a small vessel and head across a broad expanse of water, trusting they will arrive on the other side. Often they do, but when they don’t — there’s a story in that. I’m glad Grann thought so too.
Want to read some other good books about shipwrecks?
A Night to Remember by Walter Lord
Dead Wake: The Last Crossing of the Lusitania by Erik Larson
Icebound: Shipwrecked at the Edge of the World by Andrea Pitzer
In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex by Nathaniel Philbrick
Over the Edge of the World: Magellan’s Terrifying Circumnavigation of the Globe by Laurence Bergreen
“The Open Boat” by Stephan Crane (This short story is a semi-autobiographical and fictionalized account based on Crane’s surviving a shipwreck and enduring over thirty hours in a lifeboat.)
In addition to the list above, I’ve read other books about shipwrecks, but I can’t remember their titles. I read two other books about the Titanic and the Lusitania, a book about the collision between the Andrea Doria and the Stockholm off Nantucket Island, and a book about a mutiny in the Caribbean in the 1800s. Endurance: Shackleton’s Incredible Voyage is on my to-be-read pile of books. On my list of books to get and read in the near future are Left for Dead: Shipwreck, Treachery, and Survival at the Edge of the World and The Wide Wide Sea: Imperial Ambition, First Contact and the Fateful Final Voyage of Captain James Cook.
I read Nothing to Lose, Kim Suhr’s first collection of short stories, and loved it. So when Wisconsin Writers Association asked me to review Close Call, her second collection, I jumped at the chance to get an advanced copy so I could read her new collection without having to wait until October 1, 2024.
What is this book about?
Suhr serves up slices of life with intriguing, thought-provoking characters who face conundrums that will either be their undoing or their salvation. Carol, a young girl, works to save her parents’ marriage after a traveling salesman comes calling on her mother. A young married man experiences a new twist on the seven-year itch. Mrs. Morrison, once an artist but now a wife and mother, has lost her sense of self inside a calendar. Allan, an illusionist, has an unusual gift beyond ordinary magic tricks. Deena’s struggles, from childhood to adulthood, are revealed through a series of phone conversations that take place at significant moments in her life. Keith, a DMV employee, has a special talent with a camera. Isabelle, a newlywed, reconsiders her relationship with God after a tragic accident. Willie, a first-grader, gets caught up in a terrifying game of pretend. Dean, a young hockey player, meets Arnie, an old rink rat, who lives for the game of hockey.
At the end of her collection, Suhr gives us two longer stories to savor, “The Dip” and “Eradicated.” “The Dip” is about four women who have known each other since childhood. Now in their fifties, they struggle to maintain their friendship. The story is written through a series of DMs, emails, a Google doc, texts, a poem, scripts, online chat room comments, and an obituary. It takes superb writing skills to pull off this type of story, and Suhr’s talent as a writer shines through. She never lets the experimental techniques be the story, but rather she uses them to create a highly-engaging and cohesive narrative, giving us a lot to contemplate long after we finish reading it.
With “Eradicated,” Suhr presents the perfect dish to round out her collection. This dystopian tale is set in the future where artistic creativity, now labeled a disease, needs to be eradicated, a goal that is nearly complete when we meet Dr. Bells, a scientist. Wishing to observe creative artists before the last of them dies out, the doctor visits an artists’ colony where creative people, who are considered to have “disturbed minds,” have been contained after being extracted from society. Because the themes in “Eradicated” are both timely and timeless, the story sends chills up and down our spines.
What makes this book so good?
Close Call hooks us with one look. The stunning cover art features a red telephone receiver, untethered from its cradle and dropped at the end of its cord. Abandoned, the receiver rests on the floor near a dark shadow, setting the tone for the tales that follow. Stories about close calls, narrow misses, inevitable disappointments, and unavoidable failures. The cover compels us to pick up Close Call and open it, but from the first sentence, it’s Suhr’s vivid writing and intelligent, masterful storytelling that seal the deal and keep us turning the pages. Suhr promises us her collection will be exquisitely crafted, with every word, turn of phrase, and sentence essential in creating her nuanced characters and the thorny situations they face. And she delivers.
Each of Suhr’s stories in Close Call presents a fresh take on love, hate, jealousy, faith, loss, fear, conformity, and disappointment. Her ability to tell stories with unique characters, interesting plots, and captivating complications gives us a look at human nature in a different way, and as we read our way through her stories we hunger for the next one. And Suhr’s stories are a literary treat.
Published by Minnesota Historical Society Press, April 2024
Why did I read this book?
I went to the Boundary Waters Canoe Area (BWCA) in May 1982 for several days. And although I’ve never returned, I was curious to read Joe Friedrichs’s book because it’s about a place that I once visited and found beautiful beyond words, mysteriously ancient, and intensely wild.
But because Friedrichs tells the stories of people who have died or nearly died in the Boundary Waters, I hesitated to buy his book. I wondered how he would approach his topic. Then I read a review that stated Friedrich didn’t sensationalize the stories of death, but rather treated the deceased people and their loved ones with compassion. So I bought the book, and once I started reading it, I was glad I had.
What is this book about?
Friedrichs covers stories about people who have died or almost died in the Boundary Waters due to lightning, drowning, fire, cold, and falling trees. He also tells about a couple of people who entered the BWCA, disappeared, and were never seen again. While the majority of Friedrichs’s book covers tragic and near-tragic events, he also writes about other topics connected to the BWCA.
As Friedrichs vividly describes the many lakes, rivers, portages, and trails, readers are immersed in the beauty of the nearly untouched primitive wilderness that draws so many people to the Boundary Waters. He covers some of the history about how the area became a designated wilderness, and he discusses the role of fire in the life of a forest. Readers learn about the St. Louis County Rescue Squad, the Cook County Sheriff’s Department, and other rescue teams who all work together to find and rescue people who are in trouble. Or sadly, when someone has died, who work together to recover the person’s body.
What makes this book so good?
Even though Friedrichs writes about people who have died in the BWCA, he tells those stories respectfully and compassionately. He makes sure that each person he writes about is more than just the story of their death, more than just a statistic. During the research for his book, Friedrichs talked to the loved ones of those who had died in the BWCA, even traveling to other states to speak with their family and friends.
People who visit the Boundary Waters have a love of the outdoors and a passion for canoeing, kayaking, hiking, and fishing. Friedrichs, after making his first trip to the BWCA, fell in love with the untamed wilderness and moved to Minnesota, making his home near the edge of the BWCA. He has made many trips to the BWCA, and his knowledge about the area and his understanding about the type of people who find both peace and adventure there add immeasurably to his book.
While people can certainly learn from Friedrichs’s book that one needs to be prepared and practice safety when going into the wilderness, his book isn’t a how-not-to-do-things book. Because almost every single person in his book who died or almost died was prepared, experienced, and serious about safety. Instead, some unforeseen, powerful event, usually weather-related, overtook a person or people, and then no matter how much planning had been done or safety had been practiced, it all came down to luck. Humans like to believe they can control and prepare for every outcome, and that if they do, disaster will be averted. But this isn’t always true.
Finally, Friedrichs is a wonderful writer who crafted a well-organized, thoughtful, and engaging account about a one-of-a-kind place on Earth.
Reflections about my one and only Boundary Waters trip after reading Last Point of Entry . . .
When I went to the Boundary waters in May 1982, there were five of us on the trip. We were all in our early twenties. We parked our vehicles near the lake we entered and paddled to our campsite, where we stayed for the next few days. We didn’t have to portage our canoes or supplies. I was the only person who’d never been there before, and I had almost zero experience in a canoe. But I put on my life jacket every time I stepped into the canoe. I knew this would be important to help keep me afloat should we capsize. What I didn’t know, until I read Friedrichs’s book, was how fast hypothermia might have claimed my life if I had gone into the water, even with my life jacket securely buckled around my chest. He points out that May and October are popular months for people to visit the BWCA, but those months have the highest number of drownings, not because people don’t wear life jackets, but because the water is so cold and the weather is more volatile. But people like those months because there are fewer bugs. That’s why the group I was with chose May for our camping and fishing trip.
It drizzled every day we were in the BWCA, and it was cold, above freezing, but cold. We didn’t have to worry about bugs. During the day we fished on the lake by our campsite. Even in a layer of drizzle and chilled air, the scenery was incredibly beautiful. I understood that I was among something old and pristine, a wild and natural forest carved with clear lakes and rivers. Something vast that people hadn’t managed to ruin.
While our weather was cold and rainy, we didn’t experience any intense storms, so we didn’t have to worry about our canoes being swamped, trees falling on our tents, or lightning striking us. But all that came down to luck. We didn’t catch any fish either. We ate food, including steaks, that we’d brought with us. I’ve never been back to the Boundary Waters. But not because I didn’t enjoy my trip. Even in the drizzle and cold, it was amazing. But I’m not big on camping or fishing. Still, I’m glad I was able to experience the BWCA, and I understand why other people love to enter its unspoiled wilderness.
A friend of mine suggested I might like to read Djinn Patrol on the Purple Line. Not only did she love the story, she liked how Deepa Anappara structured the novel. And my friend enjoyed how many of the chapter titles were also the beginning of the first sentence in a chapter. For example:
THREE WEEKS AGO I WAS ONLY A SCHOOLKID BUT–
–now I’m a detective and also a tea-shop boy.
(And what a great sentence it is.)
What is this book about?
Nine-year-old Jai lives in India in a poor, crowded neighborhood referred to as a basti. Bordered by a smoldering rubbish dump and enveloped by an unrelenting gray smog, Jai’s life in the basti is hemmed in by poverty, garbage, pollution, and classism. The wealthy lifestyle of the hi-fi residents who live in luxurious skyscrapers separated by a high wall from his basti is beyond his reach. He lives with his older sister Runi-Didi and his Ma and Papa. His best friends are Faiz and Pari, who are also classmates.
The story opens with the disappearance of Bahadur, a quiet and unassuming boy who others rarely notice. When Bahadur doesn’t turn up, his parents and other concerned adults from the basti beg the local police to investigate. But the police refuse to take Bahadur’s disappearance seriously, and instead they threaten to have the basti bulldozed if its residents insist on causing trouble over Bahadur’s disappearance.
In answer to the indifference of the police, Jai, Faiz, and Pari declare themselves detectives. Jai, who loves to watch detective and crime shows on TV, fancies himself as the head detective. The three friends wander through their basti and the Bhoot Bazaar, asking people if they’ve seen Bahadur. They even take the Purple Line train to a neighboring city on a hunch that Bahadur may have run away or been kidnapped and taken to that city.
Soon other basti children go missing, and fear, like the pervasive smog, engulfs the basti residents. Jai, Faiz, and Pari are forbidden to leave home without an adult. But they defy their parents, and while continuing to look for Bahadur, they make inquiries about the other children who have gone missing.
What makes this book so good?
Deepa Anappara was born in India and worked as a journalist in her home country from 1997 to 2008, where she wrote about education. There is no doubt that Anappara’s personal and professional connections to India enabled her to create the realistic world in which her impoverished and marginalized characters live. Although her characters are fictional, Anappara’s portrayal of their joys, fears, hopes, and disappointments are heartbreakingly real. And most importantly, Anappara takes care not to sensationalize or diminish her characters’ stories. Instead, she has written a literary novel about the worst kind of crime. Her beautiful writing along with her measured restraint carries readers through the difficult scenes.
During her years as a journalist, Anappara interviewed many disadvantaged children, whom she found to be full of “humor, sarcasm, and energy.” While working as a journalist she learned that children from poor families disappeared at a higher rate than children from families in better circumstances. These abductions rarely made the news unless a kidnapper was caught or the details of a kidnapping were particularly gruesome. It upset Anappara that the stories of the missing children “were nowhere to be found.”
When Anappara first tried to write Djinn Patrol, she labeled her attempt a failure. In 2016, she returned to her novel. This time when she thought about the children she had interviewed in India, she remembered “their determination to survive in a society that often willfully neglected them” and she knew the story must be told from the perspective of the children. She found a way into her story, and after reading her novel, I can’t imagine it being told any other way. The story is told mostly in first person by Jai, who is at turns earnest, careless, unselfish, jealous, kind, and churlish, but who, despite his faults and missteps, captured my heart. Other times the story is told in third person through the point of view of other children.
I have to return the borrowed book to my friend. But I ordered my own copy to keep on my bookshelf. In part because like my friend, I admire Anappara’s amazing use of voice, point of view, and structure. Perhaps, I won’t read the book again, or maybe I’ll only read parts of it. Regardless, I couldn’t bear the thought of being separated from Jai, Faiz, and Pari and their dreams. And that’s the other part.
I’m a member of the Wisconsin Writers Association (WWA), and I will be attending their 2024 Writers Conference this fall. Because Lan Samantha Chang is one of the keynote speakers, WWA recently hosted a book talk about The Family Chao with Chang. So, I wanted to read the book before attending the book talk, just to avoid any spoilers.
What is this book about?
Leo Chao and his wife, Winnie, have run a successful Americanized Chinese restaurant for thirty-five years in Haven, Wisconsin, where they settled as young immigrants in a mostly white community. Their goals were to serve high-quality food and to make sure their three sons became well educated and successful. Winnie has recently left her mean-spirited, philandering husband and the family business and moved into a religious sanctuary. For years Leo Chao has been a bad husband to his wife and a bad father to his three sons, who have come to loathe and fear him, yet still seek his approval.
Dagou, their oldest, left college to help his father run the family restaurant when his mother became ill. After his mother recovered, Dagou, an excellent chef, remained based on a promise from his father that the restaurant would one day be his. Dagou is engaged to one woman but in love with another one, and he needs money to impress the new woman. When Dagou asks his father to honor his promise regarding the restaurant, his father denies the promise exists and threatens to fire Dagou.
Ming, the middle child, is a successful businessman who lives in New York City, but as a first-generation Chinese-American, he struggles with his identity. Bullied when he attended the mostly white Haven public schools and continually embarrassed by his parents, especially his father, Ming avoids his Chinese heritage and rarely returns home to Haven.
Nineteen years old, James, the youngest son, plans to become a doctor. On his way home for the Christmas holidays, he tries to save a man who suffers a medical episode in the train station. The man dies, leaving James shaken and in possession of the man’s bag, which is destined to play a part in the Chao family drama. The three brothers don’t always get along, but they rally in support of their mother and each other when the need arises.
The Chao family appears to have put aside their differences in order to unite for the yearly Christmas dinner. The next day, Leo Chang is found dead. After an investigation, one of the brothers is arrested, but the other two brothers aren’t sure their sibling killed their father, and they keep searching for the truth. As they search, they uncover other truths that have been hidden.
What makes this book so good and important?
Chang’s beautiful writing, strong plot, and richly-drawn characters pulled me into the story. Her novel reads like a Greek tragedy — with the characters’ current sorrows rooted in past transgressions committed by themselves or others. As the story unfurls, readers watch characters struggle to escape their destinies, which are perhaps not of their own choosing or their own making. On one level, Chang’s novel explores dysfunctional families and guilt and regret. But on a deeper level, she delves into how community prejudice adds to the troubles of the Chao family and to the other Asian American families in Haven, Wisconsin.
In a world of thirty-second sound bites about immigration and stereotypes, Chang’s novel provides a deep, long look at the consequences of prejudices and misunderstandings between cultures. It’s the best kind of novel — one written to make readers think and to expand their understanding of the world, all while serving up a superbly written story.
I showed up early to appointments just so I could sit and read Chang’s book without being distracted by interruptions at home.
The cover’s obscured artwork hints at ancient mythology, which is filled with tales of love, courage, tragedy, jealousy, joy, betrayal, and vengeance. Stories that are repeated by mortals again and again. Stories that repeat themselves in Italy in 1943-44 during WWII.
I bought this book on Indie Bookstore Day at the last bookstore I visited. I’d already purchased books from the other stores, but it was Indie Bookstore Day, so that meant I needed to buy at least two books from each store. (It’s an etiquette thing, like not refusing a second slice of pie when you visit your dear grandmother after she so nicely baked a strawberry-rhubarb pie for you.)
First, the book jacket caught my eye. The cover art is stunning. Next, the name Houdini stood out. When I was a child, I loved the Tony Curtis movie Houdini, loosely based on real-life magician and escape artist Harry Houdini. Then, the synopsis on the flap intrigued me: WWII, Nazis, Italy, an ancient abbey high on a hill. A young teenage orphan; a charismatic but secretive middle-aged man on a mission to save three priceless paintings; a pair of young lovers; a mysterious Italian nurse; a kind-hearted German soldier; an unusual monk; a war-broken woman; and Ferrari, a faithful mule. Finally, I read the first paragraph of the book. And this sentence sealed the deal: “I stole three paintings from the Nazis who were stealing them from the monks.” This one sentence contained intrigue, danger, irony, — and humor, a quiet, but incisive humor that works well in a story filled with sadness, destruction, and loss. I bought the book.
What is this book about?
It’s late summer, August 1943. The Allies are pushing into Italy to liberate it from the Germans. Massimo, a young teenager, has been orphaned during a recent American bombing of Rome and is heading toward Naples. Pietro Houdini, who is in his fifties, finds Massimo in a ditch. He convinces Massimo to accompany him to Montecassino Abbey, where he intends to catalogue and restore art. Massimo is smart, and as an only child, used to conversing with adults. Pietro is in his fifties and well educated. He is a cynical man who is capable of duplicity and murder to achieve his goals, yet hope, kindness, and loyalty linger inside him.
Pietro knows the Germans will come for the artwork at Montecassino. With the help of Massimo, he plans to steal three priceless paintings and a bag of ancient Greek gold. Soon it becomes evident to Pietro that the Americans will bomb Montecassino because they believe the Germans are using the abbey as part of their war strategy to thwart an Allied invasion of Italy. Time is running out to save the paintings, so Pietro revises his plans to include other people who have been living at the abbey and to use a different route of escape.
What makes this book good?
I’d never heard of Derek B. Miller, and my reasons for buying his book were impulsive (and perhaps frivolous) but I soon discovered Miller’s book has it all — richly drawn characters, a captivating plot, beautiful language, dry humor, and important themes.
The center of the story is the relationship between Pietro and Massimo. Massimo, recently orphaned, is walking to Naples, when a group of boys attack. Pietro, who is walking to Montecassino Abbey, interrupts the beating, pulls Massimo from the ditch, and convinces Massimo to go with him to Montecassino. It’s Pietro and Massimo’s growing friendship and singleness of purpose which draws readers into the story. Miller’s secondary characters, even the ones who appear briefly, will also live in readers’ imaginations, stirring emotions and raising questions about the horrors of war, which can never be answered. During a war, one thinks more about the randomness of life, the unlikely friendships people form, and the bonds that transcend both terror and time. Miller weaves the stories of his characters together, into an intricate tapestry, surprising his readers as the threads become a richly textured image.
Miller’s language and imagery create a reflective solemnity, revealing Montecassino’s mystical character. The abbey is more than ancient stone. It lives and breathes. It tells its stories to those who listen. When characters leave the abbey and enter the world of fascism and Nazis, Miller’s words paint scenes of dread and tragedy. But his descriptions of war and its brutality are sparsely, succinctly, and briefly told; so, it’s the stories of the civilians swept up in war that command center stage.
Miller uses humor throughout his novel, but The Curse of Pietro Houdini is not a comedy, and Miller’s humor is not slapstick or wordplay. It’s steeped in irony. Early in the novel, a line spoken by Pietro to Brother Tobias, regarding the treasure trove of art in the abbey, took my breath away. I read the sentence several times before moving on. I thought about quoting the sentence here, but I would rather other readers have the joy of discovering it. (If you read the book, the sentence is on page 44, almost halfway down the page. Don’t peek before you get there.)
Miller’s WWII novel explores the themes of war through the eyes of ordinary civilians whose lives have been forever altered or destroyed. While the Allied and Axis powers wage war on the battlefield, the characters face their own horrors away from the frontlines. There is much destruction in a war: felled buildings, mindless cruelty, the dead and the broken. Miller’s book tells these tales of war, but it also tells the stories of love, kindness, loyalty, bravery, and survival because these are also the stories of war.
A connection to the present . . .
After reading Miller’s book, I took a road trip. I drove east across Upper Michigan, and over a couple of hours, I met three different convoys of military vehicles heading west. The long lines of gigantic trucks in the military colors of desert tan, army green, and dark blue rumbled like beasts over the scenic tree-lined highway. I’ve passed convoys before, never feeling uneasy, never thinking of them as beasts. But I’d just finished reading Miller’s book, and because it’s set in WWII with fascists and Hitler and Mussolini, a chill cut through me each time another line of military vehicles passed by. I tried to imagine what the Italians felt during WWII as German, American, and Allied war machinery lumbered over their roads and into their cities. I thought about Hitler’s tanks and artillery guns and goose-stepping soldiers marching down streets, a show of military power meant to strike fear in his European neighbors and his own people.
Miller’s book is set in 1943-1944, but sadly dictators, invading armies, and war are timeless.
[Published by Avid Reader Press, an imprint of Simon & Schuster, Inc., 2024]
[William Morrow, An Imprint of HarperCollins Publishers, 2022.]
What is this book about?
Last Summer on State Street by Toya Wolfe is both a historical and coming-of-age novel. Set in 1999, the story follows four 12-year-old girls through a tumultuous summer of change. Set during the real-life demolition of Chicago’s Robert Taylor Homes by the Chicago Housing Authority, most of the story takes place in or around building 4950, which will soon be torn down. Twelve-year-old Felicia “Fe Fe” Stevens lives in 4950, along with her mother and teenage brother. Fe Fe and her friends, Precious and Stacia, spend their days going to school, jumping rope, and hanging out. When Fe Fe befriends Tonya, a skinny, forlorn girl with a drug addicted mother, and invites her into their circle of friends, Precious and Stacia aren’t happy.
As the summer temperatures scorch their neighborhood, trouble brews and spills into the streets. Gang wars erupt and residents endure gang shootouts and indiscriminate police violence. Fe Fe’s brother, who has managed to avoid gang life, is wrongly arrested and taken to jail. As Tonya’s beauty becomes more apparent, she can’t escape the unwanted attention of older boys. When the dynamics of Fe Fe, Precious, and Stacia’s relationships change, Fe Fe faces difficult questions about friendship and self-preservation. And as demolition day nears, Fe Fe worries about where her family will be allowed to live.
What makes this book so good?
From the first page, Wolfe’s style of prose, story-telling skills, and well-rounded characters combine to create a gripping and powerful series of events that draws the reader in and holds them throughout the book. Wolfe’s characters face crucial moments in their lives, forcing them to make tough choices in an environment that offers few options. And as her novel unfolds readers come to understand that Wolfe’s characters are complex and evolving.
Fe Fe, who narrates the story, is an adult looking back at her twelve-year-old self and her summer of seismic shifts. Wolfe creates a compelling, believable, and seamless voice for Fe Fe, who tells us a pivotal story from her youth as an adult, but at the same time as if she were still that child. I loved this weaving of Fe Fe’s voice, both young and innocent, but at the same time layered with reflection and maturity. If you’re a writer, thinking about writing a book where a character looks back at an event from their childhood, Last Summer on State Street provides an excellent model for the technique.
Why is this book important?
Wolfe’s beautifully written novel illustrates the consequences of racism and segregation against African Americans. A gripping story, skillfully told in first-person POV by Fe Fe Stevens, Wolfe’s debut novel is filled with sadness and joy, broken dreams and hope. And most importantly, it’s a book that can start conversations and encourage understanding among diverse people. Wolfe’s novel tells the story of segregated neighborhoods, poverty, fear, violence, stripped opportunities, and forced displacement. We live in a political climate where some people want to sanitize history, supposedly to spare white people uncomfortableness. But books like Wolfe’s have a much greater power to build bridges of understanding, hopefully fostering amends and shattering stereotypes.
[PEN Open Book Award finalist; Chicago Writers Association Book of the Year Award winner; Stephen Curry Underrated Literati Book Club Pick; Named a Best Book of Summer by Good Housekeeping, Chicago Magazine, The St. Louis Post Dispatch, Chicago Tribune, Veranda, The Milwaukee Sentinel, Publisher’s Weekly, among others.]
A friend of mine gave me a used copy of Where I’m Calling From: New and Selected Stories by Raymond Carver. She had picked up the book from the free shelves at our library, which is a section of books that have been donated by people who need to make room in their homes for more books. Anyone can come in, peruse those shelves, take what they want, and leave — no library card needed. People can keep the books, pass them along to friends, or donate them back to the library. Note: I’m keeping the copy of Carver’s short stories. My heirs can argue over who gets to inherit it.
My paperback edition of Carver’s stories was published in 1989 by Vintage Books: A Division of Random House. My particular copy has an intense black-and-white photo of Carver staring at his readers. The whites of Carver’s eyes are abnormally bright, suggesting an effect created by the photographer. Carver is neither smiling nor frowning, but looks like he could have done either after the shutter clicked. Every time I look at his photo, I wonder what he is thinking. This book is still in print, but the updated cover art isn’t nearly as interesting as Marion Ettlinger’s photograph of Carver, with its Mona Lisa vibe.
After my friend finished reading Carver’s book, she thought I’d like to read it. Sure, why not. I hadn’t remembered reading any of Carver’s work before. (Probably not the only gaping hole in my literary education. I still haven’t read a single Colleen Hoover novel or War and Peace.)
There is no way I’m going to take on reviewing Carver’s short story collection. Literary critics have done that. But having read the book, cover to cover, I feel compelled to share some thoughts.
If you write short stories, you might want to read Raymond Carver, not because you need to write like him, but because you will learn about craft from him. So here, and in no particular order, are random thoughts about Carver’s stories:
He writes great dialogue, conversations filled with irony, skepticism, avoidance, misunderstandings, and sarcasm — the way angry, unhappy, disillusioned, conflicted people talk.
He writes great first-person point of view narration. It’s not easy to create a character’s narrative voice that can reflect, ponder, and think about the past and the present without becoming oppressive or irritating. It’s a skill that when done right looks so easy, but when done wrong sounds like fingernails scratching on a chalkboard.
He creates characters who come to life, stirring up emotions of dread, disgust, helplessness, loss, confusion, regret, grief, boredom, uselessness, and addiction. Carver has been called a postmodernist and a minimalist. He writes about real life in a stark manner with bruised and broken characters, leaving readers to fill in between the lines, and he doesn’t provide tidy endings. But you don’t need to go all postmodernist to admire and learn from Carver’s character development.
I read Carver’s stories before bed. Some of his characters drank so much alcohol, I worried I would be hungover in the morning. They lit up one cigarette after another, filling ashtrays to overflowing. Occasionally, a joint gets passed around. The dulling of the senses is a motif in many of Carver’s stories, but it’s usually not the story. It’s an atmosphere created, one that made me psychosomatically nauseous as I read through a powerfully told, unsettling story.
I didn’t like all of Carver’s stories. To me, some of them were little more than a short conversation, and I felt something was missing. This was especially true when the dialogue pulled me in, making me want more of a story. Most of the stories I didn’t like were in the first part of the book, but I kept reading because it was Raymond Carver, who is considered one of the finest short story writers in American literature.
But I loved a lot of his stories, usually the longer ones, which were in the second half of his book. My favorites from this collection: “The Third Thing That Killed My Father Off”, “So Much Water So Close to Home”, “Careful”, “Where I’m Calling From”, “Chef’s House”, “Fever”, “Feathers”, “Cathedral”, “A Small Good Thing”, “Boxes”, “Elephant”, and “Blackbird Pie.”
Carver’s story titles throw subtle, understated jabs at the situations in his stories. The title “A Small Good Thing” nods to a sad irony in a tragic story. The title “Where I’m Calling From” is layered with multiple meanings, including its play on the phrase, where I’m coming from. The one-word title “Boxes” is brilliant in its ability to cover the physical and the metaphorical dimensions of a dysfunctional family.
Carver sometimes weaves absurdly unexpected events into the mundane. And they’re believable because Carver believes them. For example, in the story “Feathers” a city couple goes to dinner at a country couple’s house. The country couple have an ornery peacock that likes to come into the house at night, a plaster-of-Paris cast of repulsive teeth that decorates the top of their TV, and the ugliest baby one can imagine. My take-away: Don’t be afraid to throw curveballs in your story.
Even though some of Carver’s characters believe they are happy, they actually live vapid lives, teetering in the balance. So, when a complication occurs, their lives become complete crap, miring them in muck that will stick to them, even should they pull themselves out of the cesspool. The stories I liked best reveal a before, followed by a pivotal change, which lets loose a wrecking ball headed toward at least one of the characters. We don’t get to see the impact; we are left to imagine it.
Less is more. Carver’s stories say so much by not saying all of it. Every word counts for something, and he never nags. I’m reminded of Grandma’s advice: Put your jewelry on, then take one piece off. Or Marilyn Monroe’s advice: Don’t make your hairdo too perfect, or no one will notice the rest of you. You know, just “kill your little darlings.”
Of course, I looked up Carver’s own story. He died of lung cancer. He was an alcoholic, but found sobriety. He had a failed marriage, but found a second love. He died young, at 50, but he achieved a literary immortality.
A shout-out to my kind friend who handed me a collection of Carver’s stories and said, “I thought you might like to read these.” She was right.
And I recently discovered I won’t have to read War & Peace because PBS is airing it as a miniseries, starring James Norton, a dreamy British actor, who I came to adore while watching Grantchester. That means I have time to re-read David Copperfield and Huckleberry Finn then read Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver and James by Percival Everett.
On St. Patrick’s Day, I drove two hours and ten minutes to Brainerd, Minnesota, to attend a book launch for Sister Lumberjack, Candace Simar’s newest historical novel. My daughter-in-law agreed to go with me, even though she hadn’t read any of Simar’s books yet. But she loves to read, so she’s always willing to do book things with me.
I was intrigued by the story and its characters. The year is 1893, Minnesota winter is approaching, and lumberjacks are returning to the camps. Solveig Rognaldson, sixty years old and recently widowed, hopes to hire on as a cook in a lumberjack camp. Cooks earn high wages, and she needs the money to pay the mortgage on her beloved farm, or the bank will repossess it. However, logging companies don’t hire women. Nels Jensen, a young man struggling with the drink, knows he needs to grow up. He plans to work in the camps again, but he discovers he has been blacklisted. Sister Magdalena, a young, atypical nun, sells hospital tickets to lumberjacks as a form of insurance, should they get injured and need medical care. These three people come to know one another at Starkweather Timber, a logging camp where nothing runs smoothly.
Fun fact: There was a real nun who lived in Minnesota and sold hospital tickets to lumberjacks. When Simar discovered this golden nugget, she was inspired to write her book, which she said is a fictionalized account of that nun. I have to say, the idea of a nun traveling from one logging camp to another, sometimes while wearing snowshoes, captured my imagination. I was all in for a book launch in Brainerd.
Does this make me a historical fiction groupie? Perhaps! Author Candace Simar couldn’t believe that my daughter-in-law and I traveled more than two hours to come to her book launch. Several times Simar asked, “You really came all that way for my book launch?”
Yep, we did. But I explained to Simar that my daughter-in-law and I also made a day of it. We went to Christmas Point, a large, lovely gift shop, where we had a tasty lunch. Then to kill more time, we went to Target. If any of the local bookstores had been open, we would have gone to one of them instead. But it was Sunday, and I’m guessing the booksellers were all at home reading.
So, how did I become a devoted Candace Simar fan? Well, historical fiction is one of my favorite genres, and I read Simar’s historical novel Shelterbelts, which is set in Minnesota at the end of World War II, and I loved it. The novel, set in a small town, follows a cast of interesting characters as they adjust to life after the end of the war. Simar’s dedication to research, and her ability to use that research to create realistic characters and settings, took me back in time, immersing me in a beautifully written, well-told story.
Because I attended Simar’s book launch, I was able to buy a copy of Sister Lumberjack a month early. Simar’s publisher printed a run of seventy-five books, which were offered for sale. After asking Simar to sign my copy of Shelterbelts, I bought Sister Lumberjack and had her sign that too.
Candace Simar, March 17, 2024
My daughter-in-law and I helped ourselves to cookies and punch, then settled in at a table to read. I handed my copy of Shelterbelts to my daughter-in-law, and I cracked open Sister Lumberjack. We read for a bit before a couple of other Simar fans asked if they could sit with us. By this time the room was crowded with people who had come to buy a book, have it signed, and hear Simar read. We had a nice chat with the women, but soon my daughter-in-law and I drifted back to our books. I was already hooked on Sister Lumberjack, and my daughter-in-law took my copy of Shelterbelts home with her.
In a packed room, filled with attentive fans, Simar read two passages from her book, one featuring Widow Solveig and the other featuring Sister Magdalena. When she finished, the audience saluted her with a well-deserved, hearty round of applause.
I’m on “Chapter 10” in Sister Lumberjack. Once again, Simar has transported me back in time. I’m performing farm chores with Solveig, squirming when Nels takes a job with an undertaker, laughing at Sister Magdalena’s mishaps in the kitchen. And I’m learning lumberjack lingo. Best of all, Simar’s novel Sister Lumberjack is every bit as good as Shelterbelts.
Writing Near the Lake 