#108: Now You See Him

Now You See Him, by Eli Gottlieb

(New York: William Morrow, 2008)

Summary:
"The deaths of Rob Castor and his girlfriend begin a wrenching and enthrallingly suspenseful story that mines the explosive terrains of love and paternity, marriage and its delicate intricacies, family secrets and how they fester over time, and ultimately the true nature of loyalty and trust, friendship and envy, deception and manipulation.

"As the media take hold of this sensational crime, a series of unexpected revelations unleashes hidden truths in the lives of those closest to Rob. At the center of this driving narrative is Rob's childhood best friend, Nick Framingham, whose ten-year marriage to his college sweetheart is faltering. Shocked by Rob's death, Nick begins to reevaluate his own life and past, and as he does so, a fault line opens up beneath him, leading him all the way to the novel's startling conclusion."

Opening Line:
"At this late date, would it be fair to say that people, after a fashion, have come to doubt the building blocks of life itself?"

My Take:  
Side note:  While the barrage of end-of-year books I've just posted may have gotten somewhat out of order, I do know this was the last book I read in 2012. Just as parts of our lives have their own soundtracks, much of what I've done and read this past year comes with its own scenic backdrop. (Of course, some of the scenery was prettier than the rest.) There are novels I know I read in Boston because I can't see their covers without picturing the bedspread in my Boylston Street apartment; others I place in D.C. from the memory of painstakingly cramming the flimsy Days Inn pillows into place behind me so I could lean back while I read. Strangely, I could certainly look it up, but I don't know what I read in Pullman. I can see the autumn Palouse light, golden on the rolling hills and tinged pink through my window; I know I sat in the Lighty Hall atrium at lunchtime with a mocha in my right hand and a book in front of me. (What I remember from that trip is the podcast -- Frontline's "God in America" -- that served as its soundtrack: gasping uphill through the wildfire and paper mill smog in Lewiston on the way to the Nez Perce County Fair; twilight descending between the downtown taqueria with the mural and the community garden's fading sunflowers as I took the scenic route back to my hotel; gazing out the airplane window as Minneapolis fell away and realizing I'd be back amid the familiar bustle and mess of my family within hours.)

But this book did not come to Pullman. This one came to Boston over New Year's; I fiddled with the adjustable mattress as I sprawled on my bed in the Revere, the air smelling faintly of peppermint shampoo, Eliza channel-surfing and Mike doing game prep on his laptop at the art deco-inspired desk. Perhaps I sipped a glass of the wine we picked up at the 570 Market on our way back from dinner at Addis; it's likely I schlepped it to Manchester in my satchel when we drove up to see the NH side of the family.

If only. If only I could make the time to capture moments like this more frequently, rather than just sneaking them into tangentially-related blog posts like Jessica Seinfeld's vegetable brownies.

But oh, yeah, the book. Gatsby a la Richard Russo, if you transplant the title character from Roaring '20s Long Island to 21st-century Mohawk small-town Upstate New York. This is a good thing, and a good (if sad) story.

#85: Lily White

Lily White, by Susan Isaacs

New York: HarperCollins, 1996

 Summary:
"Meet Lily White, Long Island criminal defense lawyer. Smart, savvy, and down-to-earth, Lee can spot a phony the way her snooty mother can spot an Armani. Enter handsome career con man Norman Torkelson, charged with murder; to wit, strangling his latest mark after bilking her out of her life's savings. As the astounding twists and reverses of the Torkelson case are revealed, so too is the riveting story behind Lee's life.


"The critically acclaimed New York Times bestselling author ... Susan Isaacs has crafted her most dazzling novel of manners and morality. Lily White is a brilliantly crafted story of con artists and true lovers, of treachery and devotion -- and of one brave lawyer's triumphant fight for justice."

Opening Line:
"I was never a virgin."


My Take:
Needed something just plain entertaining after the density of 1491 and the often-heavy subject matter of Redemption ... plus, this is a small paperback that won't add much to the weight of my suitcase on the flight home. Should be fun.

(Afterwards) A fluffy, reasonably entertaining airplane read, which is about what I was looking for. Certainly worth the quarter I paid for it at the Boston Public Library book sale, though not one I'll need to keep around now that I've read it once. The book alternates between two stories:  Lily/ Lee's childhood, growing up in the fictional Shorehaven, Long Island in the 1960s and '70s; and the tale of her defending Norman Torkelson. Of the two, I found the former more interesting, but don't know exactly why. There's even a mystery of sorts in Lee's past: Who is the male partner she refers to throughout the book (but never by name), and how did they come together? My suspicions on this point were wrong not once, but three times (sort of), so props to Isaacs on that score -- though I'm not sure I'm 100% pleased with the final answer to this question.

Regarding the Torkelson case, this was a reasonably engaging story in itself. In brief, with no spoilers, even though the prosecution's case against Torkelson looks rock solid, and a professional con man does not the world's most sympathetic witness make, Lee's seen more than enough evidence to convince her that Norman's girlfriend Mary is a far more likely suspect. The trouble? Norman flatly refuses to let Lee talk to Mary, or to offer any defense for himself other than a simple, "I didn't kill her." Is he conning Lee, Mary, or both of them? What's Mary's own angle? And just how accurate are Lee's suspicions?

As I've said of many a book before, serious literature this one ain't -- but if you're looking for something fun to read on a trip, this will suffice.

#74: The Reader

The Reader, by Bernhard Schlink

translated by Carol Brown Janeway

(New York: Vintage International, 2008, c1997)

 Summary:

"When young Michael Berg falls ill on his way home from school, he is rescued by Hanna, a woman twice his age. In time she becomes his lover, enthralling him with her passion, but puzzling him with her odd silences. Then she disappears.

"Michael next sees Hanna when she is on trial for a hideous crime, refusing to defend herself. As he watches, he begins to realize that Hanna may be guarding a secret she considers more shameful than murder."

Opening Line:
"When I was fifteen, I got hepatitis."


My Take:
Liked the earlier segment of the story, in which Michael and Hanna become unlikely but passionate lovers despite Hanna clearly having some skeletons in her closet (and frankly, if she's a 36 year old woman having a clandestine affair with a 15 year old boy, doesn't this almost go without saying?) rather more than the later, in which Michael is a grown man studying law and Hanna on trial for war crimes. Maybe that's because I'd figured out Hanna's secret fairly early on, so the big reveal didn't have the punch it might. Maybe it's because I've read rather a lot of World War II novels (which would be screamingly obvious to my readers if I actually had any), and while the events of which Hanna is accused are certainly horrific, neither the Nazi atrocities nor the legal drama was the most compelling example of their genres that I've ever read. To be fair, both might read better a) in the original German, and b) to someone more intimately familiar with German culture and how WWII has affected subsequent generations. A well-written book with interesting imagery, even in translation, but not quite all I'd hoped for.

#70: Under the Banner of Heaven

Under the Banner of Heaven: A Story of Violent Faith, 

by Jon Krakauer

(New York: Doubleday, 2003)

 Summary:
"Jon Krakauer's literary reputation rests on insightful chronicles of lives conducted at the outer limits. In Under the Banner of Heaven, he shifts his focus from extremes of physical adventure to extremes of religious belief within our own borders. At the core of his book is an appalling double murder committed by a pair of Mormon Fundamentalist brothers, Ron and Dan Lafferty, who insist they received a revelation from God commanding them to kill their blameless victims. Beginning with a meticulously researched account of this crime, Krakauer constructs a multilayered, bone-chilling narrative of messianic delusion, savage violence, and unyielding faith. In the process, he uncovers a shadowy offshoot of America's fastest-growing religion, analyzes the abduction of fourteen-year-old Elizabeth Smart (and her forced 'marriage' to her polygamous kidnapper), and raises provocative questions about the nature of religious belief.

"Krakauer takes readers inside isolated communities in the American West, Canada, and Mexico, where some forty thousand Mormon Fundamentalists believe that the mainstream Mormon Church went unforgivably astray when it renounced polygamy. Defying both civil authorities and the Mormon establishment in Salt Lake City, the leaders of these outlaw sects are zealots who answer only to God. Marrying prodigiously and with virtual impunity (the leader of the largest fundamentalist church took seventy-five 'plural wives,' several of whom were wed to him when they were fourteen or fifteen and he was in his eighties), fundamendalist prophets exercise absolute control over the lives of their followers and preach that any day now this world will be swept clean in a hurricane of fire, sparing only their most obedient adherents.

"Weaving the story of the Lafferty brothers and their fantastical brethren with a clear-eyed look at Mormonism's violent past, Krakauer examines the underbelly of the United States' most successful homegrown faith and finds a distinctly American brand of religious extremism. The result is vintage Krakauer, an utterly compelling work of nonfiction that illuminates an otherwise confounding realm of human behavior."

Opening Line:
"Almost everyone in Utah County has heard of the Lafferty boys."


My Take:
I'll give Krakauer credit, and assume that much of what he describes was more shocking when he first published his book 9 years ago, before so many similar news and fiction accounts have been aired. That said, it's a good book and I still like his work, but would have liked him to have focused more on contemporary Mormon Fundamentalism and less on the history of Mormonism. I know his point is that the faith's violent past somehow leads to the fundamentalist horrors that bubble up now and again, but he doesn't sufficiently convince the reader how Mormonism is different in this regard from, oh, Judaism or Christianity -- both of which have plenty of violence in their own histories. Is it just because Mormonism is more hierarchical and values absolute obedience more highly? Or is there something else? A decent read, but again, the history seemed a bit too Wild West for my liking without a clear explanation of how it got us (or Mormon Fundamentalists, anyway) where we (they) are now.
 

#66: Winter's Bone

Winter's Bone, by Daniel Woodrell

(New York: Back Bay Books, 2007)

 Summary:
"The sheriff's deputy at the front door brings hard news to Ree Dolly. Her father has skipped bail on charges that he ran a crystal meth lab, and the Dollys will lose their house if he doesn't show up for his next court date.

"Ree's father has disappeared before. The Dolly clan has worked the shadowy side of the law for generations, and arrests (and attempts to avoid them) are part of life in Rathlin Valley. But the house is all they have, and Ree's father would never forfeit it to the bond company unless something awful happened. With two young brothers depending on her and a mother who's entered a kind of second childhood, Ree knows she has to bring her father back, dead or alive, or else see her family turned out into the unforgiving cold.

"Sixteen-year-old Ree, who has grown up in the harsh poverty of the Ozarks, learns quickly that asking questions of the rough Dolly clan can be a fatal mistake. She perseveres past obstacles of every kind and finally confronts the top figures in the family's hierarchy.

"Along the way to a shocking revelation, Ree discovers unexpected depths in herself and in a family network that protects its own at any cost."

Opening Line:
"Ree Dolly stood at break of day on her cold front steps and smelled coming flurries and saw meat. "

My Take:
This was a Winter's Bone day. It's a short book, and I read it all on my Kindle today -- part in my apartment after polishing off the less-than-satisfying An Inconvenient Woman, and most at the Summer Arts Festival in Copley Square while waiting for the Low Anthem set. (I'd hoped to stick around for Suzanne Vega but the weather had other plans.)

Another review I found online while looking for a synopsis to steal called Woodrell's use of language "spare and judicious," which seems pretty accurate. If you've seen the acclaimed indie movie, it actually follows the book pretty closely (except for having changed Ree's youngest sibling to a sister, which hardly matters). If anything, the movie depicts a slightly-less-hardscrabble home for Ree and her family than I'd envisioned, though the relatives' homes are pretty much as I'd pictured them. I'm not sure whether to think depiction of the rural, southern Missouri Ozarks setting is too over-the-top (again, in a spare and judicious way), or if I'm just too sheltered here on the east coast, and there really is that big a difference between central New York-style Appalachia and the Central South/ Ozark variety.

Then again, I remember driving a short 20 minutes into the backcountry with Mr. Hazel a few years ago for a hike in a state forest, and being stunned just at the shanties I could see from the road and the fact that this particular flavor of poverty existed so close to my own, smug-college-town backyard. In other words, strike the question about whether there are really Ozark communities this poor and off-grid, because there probably are.

Anyway, a good book and a good movie. I'd recommend both, if you're up for something more than a little on the dark and gritty side and aren't looking for a magical happy ending.

#65: An Inconvenient Woman

An Inconvenient Woman, by Dominick Dunne

(New York: Bantam Books, 1991 c1990)

Summary:

"Wealth. Beverly Hills billionaire, banker, and art collector Jules Mendelson and his elegant, aristocratic wife, Pauline, reign as the king and queen of West Coast high society. From their lavish mountaintop estate they preside over intimate dinner parties for ambassadors and art dealers, business tycoons and film stars. But L.A.'s royal couple is about to be dethroned.

"Murder. He's a smooth dancer with Latin charm, a member of an old Spanish Land Grant family that helped found the city, and Pauline's good friend. But when Hector Paradiso dies under the most sordid and distasteful circumstances, it's Jules who takes charge -- and takes steps to make Hector's murder look like suicide.

"Justice. Philip Quennell isn't part of their world. A young writer new to L.A., he finds observing the lives of the rich and famous fascinating. Until he discovers that the wealthy live by a different set of rules, rules that say if you have enough cash and connections you can stop a murder investigation cold. Now Quennell vows to expose those who'd let a killer go free.

"Passion. Flo March is Jules's enchanting young mistress. But between pillow talk and her own unquenchable curiosity, this beautiful redhead knows far too much about Hector's death -- and Jules's life. Soon, as intrigue threatens Jules's marriage, business, and reputation, events conspire to make Flo An Inconvenient Woman."

Opening Line:
"Later he was vilified and disgraced; Archbishop Cooning denounced him from the pulpit of Saint Vibiana's as a corruptor, and the archbishop's words spread throughout the land."

My Take:
I certainly haven't given up on Rise and Shine; truth be told, it'll probably be the more satisfying of the two, though Inconvenient Woman does promise to be guilty, Klondike-in-the-freezer, glass-of-wine-on-the-coffee-table fun for a small town homebody on her own in the big city. But I'm still not fully Kindle-ized yet, and can't quite bring myself to lie in bed with an e-reader when I want to flip through a quick chapter or 2 before going to sleep. Ergo, I'm breaking out one of the paperbacks I've had stacked on my desk for a month or so (can you tell this was one of my 25-cent finds at the library book sale) for bedtime reading. 

(tick, tock, tick, tock, tick, tock)

Sometimes you do get what you pay for. Inconvenient Woman wasn't bad enough for me not to finish -- it's the kind of fluffy, insubstantial thing that's perfect for reading at bedtime. The chapters are short enough that you can always make it through 1 or 2, the storyline doesn't require particularly close attention, and it's not compelling enough that you find yourself starting "just one more" chapter over and over till it's suddenly 2 am. 

And that's about all I can say for it. Perhaps its a period piece, but it seems something that would have been dated even in the early 1990s (though I didn't exactly move in LA high society at the time, so what do I know?) Sure, it was 20 years ago, but would the fact of Hector's being gay really have been so scandalous that no one acknowledged it? (His penchant for barely-legal PYTs and sex for money, OK.) It also doesn't help that few of the characters are especially interesting. Make that "one." Philip Quennell has potential, but we never really get under his skin enough to feel like we know what makes him tick. Yes, he's a recovering alcoholic; yes, he wrote an expose of a book before IW opens that made him some powerful enemies; yes, he's the only person in the novel who won't back down on questioning how and why Hector's death came to be labeled a suicide. (BTW, Dunne never fully clears up who did it, either, as the never-convicted killer identified at the book's end has an alibi that's never addressed.) Flo March is a runner-up, though her beautiful-but-naive working class waitress character seems a bit dated and predictable. But as for Jules and Pauline? Not just not likeable, but not particularly dislikeable or loathsome, either. He's a rich guy with powerful connections who can pull strings the rest of us can't imagine. She's a rich guy's wife with impeccable taste (of course, her bottomless bank account doesn't hurt) who initially seems more sympathetic but ultimately reveals that she's not above pulling a few strings of her own to retain her position of privilege. All in all, the book wasn't so bad that I'd be unwilling to give Dunne's take on the rich and famous another shot, especially for a quarter -- but The Nanny Diaries or a juicy, trashy Olivia Goldsmith romp it ain't.

#37: The Girl Who Played with Fire

The Girl Who Played with Fire, by Stieg Larsson (translated by Reg Keeland) (New York: Vintage Books, 2009)


Summary:
"Part blistering espionage thriller, part riveting police procedural, and part piercing expose on social injustice, The Girl Who Played with Fire is a masterful, endlessly satisfying novel.


"Mikael Blomkvist, crusading published of the magazine Millenium, has decided to run a story that will expose and extensive sex trafficking operation. On the eve of its publication, the two reporters responsible for the article are murdered, and the fingerprints found on the murder weapon belong to his friend, the troubled genius hacker Lisbeth Salander. Blomkvist, convinced of Salander's innocence, plunges into an investigation. Meanwhile, Salander herself is drawn into a murderous game of cat and mouse, which forces her to face her dark past."

Opening Line:
"She lay on her back fastened by leather straps to a narrow bed with a steel frame."

My Take:
Perhaps not quite as gripping as The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, but I don't know that I can blame Larsson for that; part of that book's punch is that it introduced us to a completely new and unexpected (to U.S.-based readers, anyhow) take on the crime/ suspense genre, and to the complicated but fascinating character of Lisbeth Salander. Neither the genre or Lisbeth are as new to us here, but both Larsson and Salander still have a few tricks left up their sleeve. Another thriller with a social conscience, and a darned fun read to boot.

#59: The Pact

The Pact: A Love Story, by Jodi Picoult (New York: HarperCollins, 1998)

Summary:
"From Jodi Picoult, one of the most powerful writers in contemporary fiction, comes a riveting, timely, heartbreaking, and terrifying novel of families in anguish -- and friendships ripped apart by inconceivable violence. Until the phone calls came at 3:00 A.M. on a November morning, the Golds and their neighbors, the Hartes, had been inseparable. It was no surprise to anyone when their teenage children, Chris and Emily, began showing signs that their relationship was moving beyond that of lifelong friends. But now seventeen-year-old Emily has been shot to death by her beloved and devoted Chris as part of an apparent suicide pact -- leaving two devastated families stranded in the dark and dense predawn, desperate for answers about an unthinkable act and the children they never really knew."

Opening Line:
"There was nothing left to say."

My Take:
Powerful? Heartbreaking? Devastating? More than a little hyperbolic, but I knew what I was getting into. I bought the book in a "buy 2, get 1 free" sale at one of the local book chains (back when we had more than one) a while back, and kept it in the bull pen till I needed it.

That time came a few weeks ago, before our long vacation -- I won't go into the gory details but it was a rough week emotionally, and I just plain needed some reasonably-absorbing escapist fiction. (Plus, maybe it's just me, but when I'm feeling like my own life's a mess, some melodramatic fiction is often just what the doctor ordered -- even at my worst, I can look at plot lines like this and reassure myself that at least I don't have it that bad.)

So The Pact fit the bill. It's obviously one of Picoult's earlier books, which is a mixed bag. On the minus side, it lacks some of the gentle ethical-dilemma-probing I've come to expect from House Rules, Handle With Care, and Vanishing Acts. However, a strong plus in my book is that she hadn't yet stumbled on her now-predictable twist ending formula (which some article I read a while back called "just kill a kid and get it over with") -- which, frankly, gets a bit tiresome after the 3rd or 4th book.

Not high literature, definitely a WYSIWYG book -- whether you think you'll enjoy it or not, you're probably right. Speaking only for myself, I'm in the "enjoy it, but in pretty small doses" camp.

#31: Ordinary Thunderstorms

Ordinary Thunderstorms, by William Boyd (New York: HarperCollins, 2010).

Summary:
"One May evening in London, Adam Kindred, a young climatologist in town for a job interview, is feeling good about the future as he sits down for a meal at a little Italian bistro. He strikes up a conversation with a solitary diner at the next table, who leaves soon afterward. With horrifying speed, this chance encounter leads to a series of malign accidents, through which Adam loses everything -- home, family, friends, job, reputation, passport, credit cards, cell phone -- never to get them back.

"The police are searching for him. There is a reward for his capture. A hired killer is stalking him. He is alone and anonymous in a huge, pitiless, modern city. Adam has nowhere to go but down -- underground. He decides to join that vast array of the disappeared and the missing who throng London's lowest levels as he tries to figure out what to do with his life and struggles to understand the forces that have made it unravel so spectacularly. Adam's quest will take him all along the river Thames, from affluent Chelsea to the gritty East End, and on the way he will encounter all manner of London's denizens -- aristocrats, prostitutes, evangelists, and policewomen -- and version after new version of himself.

"Ordinary Thunderstorms, William Boyd's electric follow-up to his award-winning Restless, is a profound and gripping novel about the fragility of social identity, the corruption at the heart of big business, and the secrets that lie hidden in the filthy underbelly of every city."

Opening Line:
"Let us start with the river -- all things begin with the river and we shall probably end there, no doubt -- but let's wait and see how we go."

My Take:
Wow! For some reason, I had a hard time getting around to starting this one, even though it's been on my reading list for nearly a year and on my library loaners shelf more than once before. Then yesterday I had a bad day (ah, the ups and downs of unemployment), polished it off in a few hours ... and man, Boyd really knocks this one out of the park.

As the jacket blurb above suggests, Ordinary Thunderstorms is most certainly a page turner. There's mystery, espionage, corporate malfeasance, a halfway-decent riches-to-rags story, and even a glimmer of a romance that manages to neither seem forced nor dominate the novel from the time it's introduced (both big peeves of mine, if that wasn't already obvious). Adam is compelling and makes you want to root for him largely because he's not perfect; he makes a few colossally stupid blunders early on in the novel (granted, if he hadn't, there wouldn't be much of a story here), and we learn that a spontaneous, unthinking fling with a grad student cost him both his last job and his marriage.

The supporting cast is likewise fun to watch and follow, even if it's more often than not in a can't look away, train wreck sort of way. With the exception of Rita, the marine police officer who unknowingly comes this close to Adam more than once before becoming obsessed with why the higher-ups suddenly released one of her highly-armed collars; and Philip Wang, the doctor/ pharmaceutical researcher whose murder Adam stumbles on in Chapter 1; they range from unsettling to sketchy to downright scary. There's Ingram, head of the company for which Wang had worked, who seems to have it made ... except for the growing realization that it's not he who's really calling the shots, and the suspicion that his mysterious ailments may be more than stress. There's Mhouse, the illiterate prostitute who laces her young son's meals with rum and Diazepam so he'll stay asleep when she goes out to work. Most ickily, there's Jonjo, the highly-trained ex-soldier who makes quite a comfortable living freelancing at what he does best, and whose sole redeeming quality seems to be that at least he loves his dog.

On top of being a darned good story, Ordinary Thunderstorms also has a lot going on between the lines. It's no accident that Adam is (or was) a climatologist by training: a man who made a living seeding clouds, demonstrating man's power to alter even the most elemental of forces. Throughout the novel, he goes from being someone who controls the weather (as his grad student, the aptly-named Fairfield Springer, observes just before their assignation, "It's like you're playing god,") to someone who struggles to control even the most basic aspects of his own life. The reader comes to realize, as the story unfolds, that the seemingly-random events that make Adam's life fall apart are, in fact, like the clouds he once seeded in his lab: the result of innumerable, interrelated human actions. Though hungry, penniless, and in fear for his life, Adam rejects the idea of turning himself into the police because he knows in doing so, he'd give up what little control he still has. Likewise, in their own ways, Ingram, Rita, Mhouse, and Jonjo all struggle (with varying degrees of success) to carve out patches of autonomy and dignity in a world where storms and uncertainties far beyond their control seem constantly at work.

Yeah, I guess I kinda liked this book -- that, and maybe I'm vicarously expounding on behalf of my daughter, who finished the ELA tests at school today. (Good thing no one's grading my blog, eh? I'd settle for someone reading it.)

#15 - Room

Room, by Emma Donoghue (New York: Little, Brown & Co., 2010).

Summary: "To five-year-old Jack, Room is the world. It's where he was born, it's where he and his Ma eat and sleep and play and learn. There are endless wonders that let loose Jack's imagination -- the snake under Bed that he constructs out of eggshells, the imaginary world projected through the TV, the coziness of Wardrobe below Ma's clothes, where she tucks him in safely at night in case Old Nick comes.

"Room is home to Jack, but to Ma it's the prison where she has been held since she was nineteen -- for seven years. Through her fierce love for her son, she has created a life for him in that eleven-by-eleven-foot space. But Jack's curiosity is building alongside her own desperation -- and she knows that Room cannot contain either much longer.

"Told in the poignant and funny voice of Jack, Room is a story of unconquerable love in harrowing circumstances, and of the diamond-hard bond between a mother and her child. It is a shocking, exhilarating, and riveting novel -- but always deeply human and always moving. Room is a place you'll never forget."

Opening Lines: "Today I'm five. I was four last night going to sleep in Wardrobe, but when I wake up in Bed in the dark I'm changed to five, abracadabra."

My Take: O. M. G. It's not often that I read a book that's generated so much buzz without feeling a let down, but this is most certainly one of those times. In a word, Room is brilliant. I came home from Job #2 & stayed up way later than I should have last night (well, at least it was late for me) finishing it; I couldn't wait to find out how things resolved.

The above summary provides the basic premise for those who've somehow missed the corona of reviews this book's generated over the past year or so. Old Nick has held Ma captive in Room for 7 years, ever since kidnapping her off the street when she was 19, and Jack's lived his entire 5 years within Room's four windowless walls. From some inexplicable reservoir of strength, Ma has managed to give Jack a remarkably healthy and secure childhood, considering. He exercises every day (piling all the furniture in the center of the room and running laps on Track, jumping on Bed a/k/a Trampoline), reads and writes and knows every story his mother can think of, and treasures the toys they've made from eggshells and old vitamin bottles. Ma strictly limits their TV viewing, is absolutely insistent on brushing teeth after each meal, and reads Dylan the Digger (one of a tiny handful of books in Room) Over. And. Over. Again. even when it gets on her last nerve. She tucks Jack into a cozy nest in Wardrobe each night, desperate to keep Old Nick from seeing him on those occasions when he stops by. Perhaps most remarkably, she never gives up hope; every weekday, she and Jack stand on Table to get as close to Skylight as they can, and scream as loud as possible in hopes that someone will hear. And it took me a while to realize that the light-flickering that occasionally wakes Jack at night is Ma's determined attempt to signal someone -- anyone -- who might see the light and investigate.

In short, Ma's prison is Jack's whole world. As she explains later, he knows the difference between real (what's inside Room) and TV, but not between Room and Outside; she can't bear to tell him that there's a whole world of fun that he's missing out on.

To Donoghue's credit, as compelling as the world she creates inside Room for Ma and Jack is, the latter part of the novel -- in which the two finally do escape -- is at least as intriguing and provocative. We've all heard the news stories about kidnap victims long given up for dead and then freed after years and years have gone by, but Room's exploration of what it's like for Ma to re-enter the world and Jack to experience Outside for the first time is absolutely stunning. For years, Ma has ached to see her parents and brother Paul again, to swing with Jack as she once did with Paul in the backyard hammock ... only to find that her parents' marriage didn't survive their grief at losing her (Ma's mother never gave up hope; her father believed her dead and even held a memorial service). Jack's first-ever outing without Ma -- a trip to the Museum of Natural History with Paul and his family -- is rescheduled, when he's overwhelmed by what's supposed to be just a quick pit stop at the local mall. Likewise, his newfound grandmother takes him to a playground only to find that he doesn't know how to play with other children. Trapped indoors for years, both Jack and Ma sunburn at the drop of a hat. That's probably more than enough spoilers to tease those of you (all my legions of readers), but I can't say it loudly enough: You must read this book.

#11: Native Son

Don't think I've mentioned this here yet, but I've been listening to an audiobook of Richard Wright's Native Son (New York: Random House, 1940).

Summary: "After 58 years in print, Wright's Native Son has acquired classic status. It has not, however, lost its power to shock or provoke controversy. Bigger Thomas is a young black man in 1940s Chicago who accidentally kills the daughter of his wealthy white employer. He tries to frame the young woman's fiance for the crime and attempts to extort ransom from the victim's family, but his guilt is discovered, and he is forced into hiding. After a terrifying manhunt, he is arrested and brought to trial. Though his fate is certain, he finds that his crimes have given meaning and energy to his previously aimless life, and he goes to his execution unrepentant. Wright avoids the trap of making his hero a martyr, for Bigger is a vicious and violent bully. But out of this tale the author develops a profoundly disturbing image of racism and its results that puts Bigger's experience in horrifying perspective." (-Library Journal Review)

Opening Lines:
"Brrrrrriiiiiinnng!

"An alarm clock clanged in the dark and silent room. A bed spring creaked. A woman's voice sang out impatiently:

"'Bigger, shut that thing off!'"

My Take: I'm just about halfway through the book right now (Bigger's just fled his employer's home, knowing his crime is about to be discovered). Incredibly disturbing, suspenseful, and surprisingly contemporary. I suspect this will be one of this books I appreciate deeply, but can't really say I like.

Wow. Maybe it's the way I took this book in -- a few tracks at a time over several weeks, while in the car or doing the dishes -- but when I finished it last night, I felt both bereft and deeply satisfied. The book's a classic, and synopses/ study guides/ Cliff Notes abound on the internet; I won't spend time providing another one here. But the way Wright unfolds Bigger's story is nothing short of masterful. Even now, having finished the novel, it's hard to wrap my brain around how I could feel at once appalled by the murders Bigger's committed and unconvinced that things could have gone any other way. His jail conversations with Boris Max, lawyer and eventual friend, bring about an ending that's simultaneously devastating, terrifying, and ever-so-slightly hopeful. Frankly, I can't do this book justice.

#89 - Innocent

Innocent, by Scott Turow (New York: Grand Central Publishing, 2010).

Summary: "More than twenty years after Rusty Sabich and Tommy Molto went head-to-head in the shattering murder trial of Presumed Innocent, the men are pitted against each other once again in a riveting psychological match. When Sabich, now over sixty years old and the chief judge of an appellate court, finds his wife, Barbara, dead under mysterious circumstances, Molto accuses him of murder for the second time, setting into motion a trial that is vintage Turow—the courtroom at its most taut and explosive.

"With his characteristic insight into both the dark truths of the human psyche and the dense intricacies of the criminal justice system, Scott Turow proves once again that some books simply compel us to read late into the night, desperate to know who did it."

Opening Lines: "A man is sitting on a bed. He is my father.

"The body of a woman is beneath the covers. She was my mother."

My Take: Not surprisingly, this one was about what I'd expected. Yes, it entertained; no, it didn't disappoint.

The latter's always a risk in a situation like this. It seems almost everyone's read Presumed Innocent, or at least seen the Harrison Ford movie. The ending there was surprising enough, and the characters sufficiently compelling, that you can't help wondering what happened to Sabich and Molto and all their other pals after all those years; heck, I don't think I've been as excited about a much-delayed sequel since Michael Tolliver Lives came out. But for all that readers are curious, we're also an oddly proprietary lot. Even for an accomplished author like Turow, it's a fine line to walk: the next installment needs to seem logical and plausible given what we know of the characters, but not so logical that it seems obvious or unsurprising.

Fortunately, Innocent seems to pull it off. Many of the characters we remember from Presumed Innocent are back, and one of the things that makes this book work so well both as a sequel and a stand-alone is that they've both changed ... and they haven't. Time has passed, and their lives have taken unexpected turns, but nothing we see here is out of character with the folks we've gotten to know. At 60, Tommy Molto has recently married a much-younger woman and is the proud father of a small son. After a brief separation following Rusty's first trial, he and Barbara reconciled, but Barbara struggles with bipolar disorder and their relationship is a rocky one. Their son, Nate, is 22, a newly-minted lawyer himself, and still wrestling to carve out an adult identity and relationships apart from his parents.

And that's where we come in. When we pick up the story, Barbara has just turned up dead one morning, apparently of natural causes ... or is it? If so, why did Rusty sit beside her body for a full day before notifying the police, or even his son? And what's the significance of Rusty's recent affair with a young law clerk (which we learn about in the first few chapters) -- his first since the ill-fated tryst recalled in Presumed Innocent? I formed a few theories early on about how the story would ultimately end, and for once, I'm glad to say I was wrong. Great literature it's not, but an enjoyable legal suspense novel -- absolutely.

#86 - A Girl's Gotta Do What a Girl's Gotta Do

A Girl's Gotta Do What a Girl's Gotta Do: The Ultimate Guide to Living Safe & Smart, by Kathleen Baty (New York: Rodale, 2003)

Jacket Summary: "Sassy single gal, high-powered exec in high heels, carefree college co-ed, harried soccer mom -- no matter who you are, you deserve to feel secure doing your own thing anytime, anywhere. With a little help from the Safety Chick, it's a cinch. Sharing lesson's she's learned -- the hard way -- along with proven tips from a battery of experts in street smarts, Kathleen Baty gets specific about what to pack for a business trip, where it's safe to shop online, when to report a creepy co-worker, and how to tell that guy who's bothering you at the bar to get lost -- for good. Complete with step-by-step instructions on how to stop an assailant dead in his tracks with your words, your hands, or, if necessary, a few easy-to-use self-defense weapons, this book is a master class in personal safety for women of all ages."

Table of Contents:

• Foreward by Gavin de Becker
• Preface: So ... Who Is This 'Safety Chick'?
• Introduction: Safety Savvy - Why It's Hip to Be an Empowered Chick
• Chapter 1: Intuition - An Absolute 'Must Have' in Your Personal Safety Wardrobe
• Chapter 2: Girl on the Go - Travel and Hotel Safety Tips for Women on the Road
• Chapter 3: Party Girl, Watch Your Cocktail - How to Protect Yourself from Being Slipped a Mickey Out on the Town
• Chapter 4: Beauty Night - How to Feel Safe When It's Girls' Night In
• Chapter 5: A Girl's Gotta Shop - How to Avoid Getting Ripped Off When You're Trying to Buy
• Chapter 6: Guys Who Won't Take No for an Answer - How to Protect Yourself from a Stalker
• Chapter 7: Working Girl - Tips on Recognizing and Avoiding Workplace Violence
• Chapter 8: CyberGirl - Inside Tips to Help You Minimize the Dangers of Surfing the Net
• Chapter 9: Keep Your Hands to Yourself! Domestic Violence Is Not a Family Matter ... It's a Crime
• Chapter 10: Hand-to-Hand Combat - Should You Stay or Should You Go?
• Chapter 11: Pick Your Poison - Self-Defense Products to Help You Stay Safe and Feel Empowered
• Afterword: You Go, Girl! Taking Your Safety Chick Smarts to the Streets
• A Resource Guide: Empower Yourself - Organizations That Can Assist You in Your Time of Need

My Take: In a word (or a grunt), eh. I'm not quite sure why I picked this one up; I think it was a catchy title on a yellow spine, shelved near something else I was actively looking for. Serves me right for going on first impressions. The too-jiggly descriptions of "carefree college co-eds" and "sassy single gals" on the back cover should have been a clue that I'd find the book's tone annoying; well, I did. While you can't fully learn self-defense from a book, this one does offer some useful and important general pointers, chiefly about trusting your intuition and staying aware of your surroundings. I also found the chapter on travel safety (from hotels to airports to taxis) to be pretty good overall -- not over-the-top hysterical, and offers some pointers I might not have though of on my own. Even the "Party Girl" chapter, on safe dating and clubbing, was OK; the emphasis on date rape drugs seemed a bit excessive, but hey, this is a book on personal safety, and I was in college wwwaaayyy back in the day when we were just starting to hear sensationalist newspaper articles about something called rohypnol.

Then Baty gets to the "Beauty Night" chapter, on home safety ... and things start to get a wee bit silly. She starts out asserting that all women deserve to feel safe in their own homes, but then delves into a list of rather excessive suggestions that a) probably won't make much difference, and b) would tend to make me feel more paranoid and unsafe, rather than less. Yes, it's just common sense that one shouldn't open the door without knowing who's there, shouldn't engage with the Fuller Brush Man or other door-to-door salesperson if your hinky meter is going off, and so on ... but buying men's workboots to leave by the door? Equipping a windowless safety bunker with a flashlight, phone, and weapon? Keeping pepper spray or foam under the bed? Playing a tape recording of a barking dog? Maybe I've been living in a small town for too long, or am just naive, but in the absence of a clear, specific threat, this seems like overkill. The subsequent chapters weren't quite as bad (at least not consistently), but from that point on, I couldn't help thinking of a posting I'd read last week on Lenore Skenazy's Free Range Kids blog. Yes, it makes sense to pay attention to both your surroundings and your gut; sometimes, it can even take some practice to know what one or the other is telling you. But Baty's book seems to take a Homeland Security/ TSA approach: you must do something to make yourself feel safer, even if it's out of proportion to any real threat and not all that effective, anyway. Admittedly, I've never been the victim of a crime, and Baty has (she talks in the preface about a former high school classmate stalking and ultimately attempting to kidnap her before he was arrested) -- but if the alternative is a level of Constant! Vigilance! that would make Mad-Eye Moody proud, I think I'll take the risk.

#77 - Mr. Peanut

Mr. Peanut, by Adam Ross (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2010).

Summary: "David Pepin has loved his wife, Alice, since the moment they met in a university seminar on Alfred Hitchcock. After thirteen years of marriage he still can't imagine living without her -- yet he obsessively contemplates her demise. Soon she is dead, and he is both deeply distraught and the prime suspect.

"The detectives investigating Alice's suspicious death have plenty of personal experience with conjugal enigmas: Ward Hastroll was happily married until his wife inexplicably became voluntarily and militantly bedridden; and Sam Sheppard is especially sensitive to the intricacies of marital guilt and innocence, having decades before been convicted and then exonerated of the brutal murder of his wife.

"Still, these men are in the business of figuring things out, even as Pepin's role in Alice's death grows even more confounding when they link him to a highly unusual hit man called Mobius. Like the Escher drawings that inspire the computer games David designs for a living, these complex, interlocking dramas are structurally and emotionally intense, subtle, and intriguing; they brilliantly explore the warring impulses of affection and hatred, and pose a host of arresting questions. Is it possible to know anyone fully, completely? Are murder and marriage two sides of the same coin, each endlessly recycling into the other? And what, in the end, is the truth about love?

"Mesmerizing, exhilarating, and profoundly moving, Mr. Peanut is a police procedural of the soul, a poignant investigation of the relentlessly mysterious human heart -- and a first novel of the highest order."

Opening Line: "When David Pepin first dreamed of killing his wife, he didn't kill her himself."

My Take: Yeah, after a 500+-page tome on the horrors of war and a much-shorter book so filled with higher-level math as to seem like another language, I think it's time for something a little lighter ... like a story about a guy who may or may not have murdered his wife, say.

Well, that was disappointing. The reviewers were all over this one; Scott Turow, in the New York Times, calls it "daring [and] arresting ... an enormous success -- forceful and involving, often deeply stirring and always impressively original." The Wall Street Journal and The New Yorker, while not quite as laudatory, were nonetheless mostly positive. While I can't say I found it awful, I did end up wondering if these reviewers read the same book I did. Even Turow acknowledges that the novel's point of view is "overwhelmingly male." I don't object to this per se; heck, half the population is male. However, what all the reviewers seem to miss is that if you're offering a compelling meditation on marriage, it helps to have all your principals be at least reasonably sympathetic. In this area, Mr. Peanut falls far short of the mark. I usually avoid published reviews while I'm actually reading a book, lest they unduly influence my own experience, but here, I broke the rule about halfway through because I was desperate to see what others saw in the novel. Turow calls the three wives withholding, but that's not the half of it; both Alice and the voluntarily-bedridden Hannah Hastroll are so dramatic, manipulative, and uncommunicative that I just couldn't see why David and Ward didn't, to quote Dan Savage, DTMFA. A grown woman feels like she's become invisible to her husband, and just plain stops getting out of bed, letting her husband bring meals on a tray, for months on end? (How she washes or goes to the bathroom remain a mystery.) Another adult pitches constant temper tantrums, walking out on or refusing to speak to her partner for some perceived slight? I mean, really. For one character in a novel to behave like this could have been intriguing, an exploration of the complicated, sometimes dysfunctional pas de deux that evolves over time between long-married partners. For two unconnected characters to do it, and a third (Marilyn Sheppard) to take at least some steps in this direction, makes me wonder if Ross is working through some issues of his own here. (At least Marilyn, despite her unilateral decision to have a sexless marriage, is rendered with some sympathetic qualities; Alice has precious few, and Hannah none.)

This is really too bad, because the story otherwise raises some interesting issues. To what extent might both partners in a marriage be complicit in one partner's affair? How does infertility affect a couple's relationship? (Had Ross toned down Alice's histrionics, the part about her having a second-trimester miscarriage while on vacation would have been far more moving.) If you've ever imagined the death of someone you love, what kind of guilt do you carry if and when that person does die? Unfortunately, Mr. Peanut seems too busy scratching the surface of many different issues to really do any one of them justice.

#57 - The Good Thief

The Good Thief, by Hannah Tinti (New York: Dial Press, 2008)

Jacket summary: "Richly imagined, gothically spooky, and replete with the ingenious storytelling ability of a born novelist, The Good Thief introduces one of the most appealing young heroes in contemporary fiction and ratifies Hannah Tinti as one of our most exciting new talents.

"Twelve-year-old Ren is missing his left hand. How it was lost is a mystery that Ren has been trying to solve for his entire life, as well as who his parents are, and why he was abandoned as an infant at Saint Anthony's Orphanage for boys. He longs for a family to call his own and is terrified of the day he will be sent alone into the world.

"But then a young man named Benjamin Nab appears, claiming to be Ren's long-lost brother, and his convincing tale of how Ren lost his hand and his parents persuades the monks at the orphanage to release the boy and to give Ren some hope. But is Benjamin really who he says he is? Journeying through a New England of whaling towns and meadowed farmlands, Ren is introduced to a vibrant world of hardscrabble adventure filled with outrageous scam artists, grave robbers, and petty thieves. If he stays, Ren becomes one of them. If he goes, he's lost once again. As Ren begins to find clues to his hidden parentage he comes to suspect that Benjamin not only holds the key to his future, but to his past as well."

Opening line: "The man arrived after morning prayers."

My take: Pretty darned good for a picaresque, and this is saying a lot, as this isn't usually my favorite genre. Cliche though it may be, I can't help rooting for an orphans hard-luck story -- even when the orphan, like Ren, is a petty thief from the get-go. As an infant, the one-handed Ren was pushed through a hole in a Boston monastery wall by an anonymous stranger on a miserable, rainy night. Now, twelve years later, he's too old for those couples who occasionally come to the monastery seeking a child to raise on their own, and his missing hand renders him unsuitable for those who want an older lad to help with the farm work. Consequently, he's pretty much resigned to being sold off/ conscripted into the army once he's of age, and when Benjamin Nab suddenly appears, claiming to be his long-lost brother and planning to take Ren away, neither Ren nor Father Joseph ask too many questions.

And that's where the real adventure begins. While Ren may be an incorrigible thief (he even swipes Father John's Lives of the Saints on his way out the door, just because), he's downright saintly compared to Benjamin and his ex-schoolteacher crony, Tom. While the term may not have been widely used 200 years ago, take my word for it -- these guys defined the word "sleazeballs." They hop from town to town, running minor variations on the con du jour until the locals wise up; in one chapter, they sell a magical bottled elixir that's guaranteed to cure naughty children's misbehavior (which it does, seeing as it's laced heavily with opium). When they need a big score, they rob graves. This horrifies the Catholic-raised Ren, especially on his first excursion; as he stands guard in the getaway wagon, he sees one of the first corpses harvested that night start to sit up. Mr. Buried-Alive turns out to be Dolly, a tattered but unrepentant murderer. Inexplicably, Ren repeatedly convinces Benjamin and Tom to let Dolly live and not abandon them, and an odd friendship of sorts forms between the two.

Several factors kept me reading in spite of the grotesquerie, the foremost of which is that I was just plain curious about Ren's identity and past. The one clue he has is a scrap of collar, hand-embroidered with the letters "R E N," which he's carried on his person since it was found in his bassinet with him. We learn almost immediately that Benjamin's long-lost brother story is a ruse, and we don't know what to make of his next tale (he tells Tom that Ren is his son), but we know he's important somehow, and must have had some reason for picking Ren out of the orphans' lineup. Then, too, I couldn't decide whether to prepare myself for yet another "rogues with hearts of gold deep-down" ending, or just plain wonder what it would mean for this pair of old-school bad-asses to saddle themselves, over the course of the novel, with more and more human baggage: Ren, Dolly, a half-deaf landlady with a mysterious nighttime visitor, and a brace of inseparable orphan twins whose back story (their mother committed suicide) is at least as pathetic as Ren's own.

The Good Thief is a quick and entertaining read. Give it a try, even if you're not sure it's your cup of tea.

#45 - Secrets of Eden

Yesterday -- only a day overdue! -- I finished Secrets of Eden (New York: Shaye Areheart Books, 2010).

Jacket summary: "'There,' says Alice Hayward to Reverend Stephen Drew, just after her baptism, and just before going home to the husband who will kill her that evening and then shoot himself. Drew, tortured by the cryptic finality of that short utterance, finds his faith in God slipping away and is saved from despair only by a meeting with Heather Laurent, the author of wildly successful, inspirational books about .. angels.

"Heather survived a childhood that culminated in her own parents' murder-suicide, so she identifies deeply with Alice's daughter, Katie, offering herself as a mentor for the girl and a shoulder for Stephen -- who flees the pulpit to be with Heather and see if there is anything to be salvaged from the spiritual wreckage around him.

"But then the state's attorney begins to suspect that Alice's husband may not have killed himself ... and finds out that Alice had secrets only her minister knew."

Opening line: "As a minister I rarely found the entirety of a Sunday service depressing."

My take: Initially, I felt like I was reading the much-revised final version of a story that started out as The Law of Similars. I got over it -- Secrets ultimately proved to be a stronger book -- but it nonetheless had its flaws, and is a long way from being as compelling as Midwives or The Double Bind.

Set in contemporary, bucolic Haverhill, Vermont, Secrets of Eden is narrated in turn by four different characters: Stephen Drew, the (so it seems) unusually bereaved and guilty pastor who baptized Alice only hours before her death; state attorney Catherine Benincasa, whose storybook family life contrasts dramatically with the horrors she sees in her work, and who becomes suspicious of Drew almost immediately; Heather Laurent, rock star author whose hippie-dippie, New Age-y beliefs about angels stem from a pivotal moment in her own tragic childhood; and Katie, the Haywards' now-orphaned 15-year-old daughter and all-around Good Kid, whose future the others can only begin to imagine.

You just know when you start a book like this that there's going to be a twist at the end. There is, of course, and I'm a bit disappointed in myself for not guessing correctly what it would be. We do learn, fairly early on, that whether or not it resembles Eden, there are secrets aplenty in Haverhill. Alice's diary is found, and its easily-deciphered code reveals that Stephen was her lover as well as her pastor. Crime scene analysis (I'll spare you the grisly details, which seemed a bit over the top to me) suggests that while George Hayward may have killed Alice, he probably didn't shoot himself. And Stephen, whose faith was faltering even before Alice's murder, feels called to leave his pulpit and Haverhill ... only to arrive in New York City on Heather's doorstep. Understandably, this starts to look a little suspicious.

Perhaps the book would have been more compelling had the narrators been introduced in a different order. Other reviewers have complained that Stephen is unlikeable, and while I don't disagree, I think the bigger problem is that he's just not very interesting. This is too bad, as the introductory chapter -- in which he ponders his growing irritation with the (in his words) whiny concerns his church members bring forward for prayer each Sunday -- has some promise; suggesting a disillusionment with the ministry that's at once funny and sad. Likewise, Catherine Benincasa, the second narrator, just doesn't seem to fit into the story all that well. Sure, I understand her role as the state's attorney, but we see very little of her actually interacting with Stephen, Katie, or any of the other principals. It's as though Bohjalian dropped her in to provide explanations, forgetting that it's always more interesting to be shown than to be told.

Heather's narrative is more solid, and the character more likeable, than the previous two, but as with Law of Similars, it's hard to understand how she and Stephen become romantically involved. Given that she herself was orphaned by her own parents' murder-suicide, after witnessing years of their abuse, her empathy for Katie makes sense, but I think we'd have had a better story had the author not needed to shoehorn this whirlwind love affair between troubled souls in there.

Katie's section seemed to me the strongest of the four, probably because Bohjalian succeeds in capturing the minutae that make an adolescent character believable: her awkwardness about imposing on her best friend's family, who take her in after her parents die; her bemused observation about teachers giving her a free pass; her complicated views and feelings about her parents' marriage. Unfortunately, the skillful way in which she's rendered doesn't manage to give us a deeper understanding of her parents, or even get to know Heather and Stephen more thoroughly. In the end, it's only mildly interesting to find out what really happened, and only Katie we can bring ourselves to care or wonder about once the book ends.

#20 - House Rules

More pure entertainment here. Can you tell I needed some lighter diversionary stuff while I worked my way through Pygmy? House Rules is pretty much vintage Picoult, complete with twist ending (not quite up to her usual standards here; I had this one figured out about a quarter of the way through), plucky single mom, multiple narrators, and love interest who initially gets to know the family professionally.

Jacket summary: "The astonishing new novel from #1 New York Times bestselling author Jodi Picoult about a family torn apart by an accusation of murder. 'They tell me I'm lucky to have a son who's so verbal, who is blisteringly intelligent, who can take apart the broken microwave and have it working again an hour later. They think there is no greater hell than having a son who is locked in his own world, unaware that there's a wider one to explore. But try having a son who is locked in his own world, and still wants to make a connection. A son who tries to be like everyone else, but truly doesn't know how.' Jacob Hunt is a teenage boy with Asperger's syndrome. He's hopeless at reading social cues or expressing himself well to others, and like many kids with AS, Jacob has a special focus on one subject -- in his case, forensic analysis. He's always showing up at crime scenes, thanks to the police scanner he keeps in his room, and telling the cops what they need to do...and he's usually right. But then his town is rocked by a terrible murder and, for a change, the police come to Jacob with questions. All of the hallmark behaviors of Asperger's -- not looking someone in the eye, stimulatory tics and twitches, flat affect -- can look a lot like guilt to law enforcement personnel. Suddenly, Jacob and his family, who only want to fit in, feel the spotlight shining directly on them. For his mother, Emma, it's a brutal reminder of the intolerance and misunderstanding that always threaten her family. For his brother, Theo, it's another indication of why nothing is normal because of Jacob. And over this small family the soul-searing question looms: Did Jacob commit murder? Emotionally powerful from beginning to end, House Rules looks at what it means to be different in our society, how autism affects a family, and how our legal system works well for people who communicate a certain way -- and fails those who don't."

In short, not much was surprising about this book, but that was OK. Picoult's one of those authors I pick up not because I expect great literature, but because I want to be entertained for an evening or a weekend. She's got a solid formula for this, and it mostly works. If you like her other books, you'll probably like this one, though most reader reviews agree that it's not her best effort, and has more than a few plot holes. Narrators include the obvious (Jacob; his mother, Emma; neglected younger brother, Theo) and the usual secondaries (Oliver, the well-meaning but inexperienced attorney; Detective Matson, a good-guy detective who's convinced Jacob did the crime). Picoult offers several interesting metaphors about living with Asperger's, both first-hand and as a family member, though I do wish she hadn't harped so much on the whole caused-by-vaccines controversy, and her portrayal of the growing "Aspie" community was downright insulting. Worth a read, but probably not a hardcover (or even new paperback) purchase.

127 - The White Tiger

And then last night, after the guests had gone and the dishes were washed, I finished The White Tiger, by Aravind Adiga (New York: Free Press, 2008).

Jacket excerpt: "Balram Halwai is a complicated man. Servant. Philosopher, Entrepreneur. Murderer. Over the course of seven nights, Balram tells us the terrible and transfixing story of how he came to be a success in life -- having nothing but his own wits to help him along. And with a charisma as undeniable as it is unexpected, Balram teaches us that religion doesn't create virtue, and money doesn't solve every problem -- but decency can still be found in a corrupt world, and you can get what you want out of life if you eavesdrop on the right conversations.

"Amoral, irreverent, deeply endearing, and utterly contemporary, this novel is an international sensation -- and a startling, provocative debut."

It's just been a night, and there've been a few other things going on lately (Christmas brunch for 25, anyone?), so I'm still trying to figure out what I think of this one. The novel is set in contemporary India, but not an India that will seem familiar to western readers or flattering to Indians themselves. As New York Times reviewer Akash Kapur describes it,

"[T]he background against which [Balram] operates is not just a resurgent economy and nation but a landscape of corruption, inequality and poverty. In some of the book’s more convincing passages, Balram describes his family’s life in 'the Darkness,' a region deep in the heartland marked by medieval hardship, where brutal landlords hold sway, children are pulled out of school into indentured servitude and elections are routinely bought and sold.

"This grim world is far removed from the glossy images of Bollywood stars and technology entrepreneurs that have been displacing earlier (and equally clichéd) Indian stereotypes featuring yoga and spirituality. It is not a world that rich urban Indians like to see. Indeed, when Adiga’s book recently won the Man Booker Prize, some in India lambasted it as a Western conspiracy to deny the country’s economic progress. Yet Adiga isn’t impressed by such nationalistic fervor. In bare, unsentimental prose, he strips away the sheen of a self-congratulatory nation and reveals instead a country where the social compact is being stretched to the breaking point."

The stark brutality of the setting is perhaps the most interesting aspect of the novel, though I agree with Kapur's assessment about it getting monotonous after a while. Likewise, I'll grant that the protagonist, former Laxmangarh peasant cum driver cum Bangalore entrepreneur Balram Halwai, is complex and intriguing, but don't know if I'd go so far as to call him roguish or charismatic as other (real) reviewers have done. And the book's other characters -- weak, spineless Ashok, Balram's employer and eventual victim; the inscrutable Vijay, his first exposure to Indian-style entrepreneurship; and amoral, opportunistic fellow driver Vitiglio Lips, who shows him the way to get there (shady as it may be) -- are completely one-dimensional. If you read the novel as a parable, this makes some sense, but leaves you with an ultimately unsatisfying resolution to the complex questions it raises.

The novel is an epistolary of sorts: over the course of seven nights, Balram writes a long letter to Chinese premier Wen Jiabao, ostensibly on the eve of a state visit by the latter to India, with the goal of "[telling him], free of charge, the truth about Bangalore. By telling [him] my life's story." As he explains rather circuitously in the first chapter,

"Neither you nor I speak English, but there are some things that can be said only in English.

"My ex-employer the late Mr. Ashok's ex-wife, Pinky Madam, taught me one of these things, and at 11:32 p.m. today, which was about ten minutes ago, when the lady on All India Radio announced, 'Premier Jiabao is coming to Bangalore next week,' I said that thing at once.

"In fact, each time when great men like you visit our country I say it. Not that I have anything against great men. In my way, sir, I consider myself one of your kind. But whenever I see our prime minister and his distinguished sidekicks drive to the airport in black cars and get out and do namaste before you in front of a TV camera and tell you about how moral and saintly India is, I have to say that thing in English. ...

"You hope to learn how to make a few Chinese entrepreneurs, that's why you're visiting. That made me feel good. But then it hit me that in keeping with international protocol, the prime minister and foreign minister of my country will meet you at the airport with garlands, small take-home sandalwood statues of Gandhi, and a booklet full of information about India's past, present, and future.

"That's when I had to say that thing in English, sir. Out loud.

"That was at 11:37 p.m. Five minutes ago.

"I don't just swear and curse. I'm a man of action and change. I decided right there and then to start dictating a letter to you. ...

"Out of respect for the love of liberty shown by the Chinese people, and also in the belief that the future of the world lies with the yellow man and the brown man now that our erstwhile master, the white-skinned man, has wasted himself through buggery, cell phone usage, and drug abuse, I offer to tell you, free of charge, the truth about Bangalore.

"By telling you my lifes story.

"See, when you come to Bangalore, and stop at a traffic light, some boy will run up to your car and knock on your window, while holding up a bootlegged copy of an American business book, wrapped carefully in cellophane and with a title like:

TEN SECRETS OF BUSINESS SUCCESS!

or

BECOME AN ENTREPRENEUR IN SEVEN EASY DAYS!

"Don't wast your money on those American books. They're so yesterday.

"I am tomorrow. ...

"Let us begin.

"Before we do that, sir, the phrase in English that I learned from my ex-employer the late Mr. Ashok's ex-wife Pinky Madam is:

"What a fucking joke."

By the end of "The First Night," the plot has been outlined for us: Balram has somehow risen above his humble, nameless beginnings as the son of a Laxmangarh rickshaw puller to become a successful Bangalore entrepreneur, and oh, yes, murdered the aforementioned "ex-employer the late Mr. Ashok" along the way. He spends the next six days filling Premier Wen in on the details of this journey.

But if the characters are a bit flat, the setting and supporting details are brilliantly rendered. A bit simplistic? Yes, but so are woodcuts and graphic novels, which is part and parcel of their artistry. As an allegory, The White Tiger is fascinating; if it's imperfect, well, perhaps that's where future books and authors should begin. Early on, Adiga offers a stark, micro-level description of the much-ballyhooed success stories of India's hi-tech sector ("The Light") and "The Darkness" that comprises Balram's world:

"A rich man's body is like a premium cotton pillow, white and soft and blank. Ours are different. My father's spine was a knotted rope, the kind that women use in villages to pull water from wells; the clavicle curved around his neck in high relief, like a dog's collar; cuts and nicks and scars, like little whip marks in his flesh, ran down his chest and waist. ... The story of a poor man's life is written on his body, in a sharp pen."

However dull and primitive their rich masters imagine them to be, the poor are not only aware that their lives of toil, indignity, and abuse are less than fully human, but fully capable of envisioning something better -- if not for themselves, then for their children. As Balram recalls his father, who has since died of TB and neglect in a filthy Laxmangarh hospital, saying: "'My whole life, I have been treated like a donkey. All I want is that one son of mine -- at least one -- should live like a man.'" At the time, he muses, "What it meant to live like a man was a mystery." Gradually, though, the answer dawns on him: what keeps the poor enslaved is their passivity:

"Go to Old Delhi, behind the Jama Masjid, and look at the way they keep the chickens there in the market. Hundreds of pale hens and brightly colored roosters, stuffed tightly into wire-mesh cages, packed as tightly as worms in a belly, pecking each other and shitting on each other, jostling just for breathing space; the whole cage giving off a horrible stench -- the stench of terrified, feathered flesh. On the wooden desk above this coop sits a grinning young butcher, showing off the flesh and organs of a recently chopped-up chicken, still oleaginous with a coating of dark blood. The roosters in the coop smell the blood from above. They see the organs of their brothers lying around them. They know they're next. Yet they do not rebel. The do not try to get out of the coop.

"The very same thing is done with human beings in this country."

While Balram pays lip service to a poetic definition of freedom that fits with the "moral and saintly India" he derides ("Iqbal, that great poet, was so right. The moment you recognize what is beautiful in this world, you stop being a slave. ... If you taught every poor boy how to paint, that would be the end of the rich in India."), ultimately, it's not poetry, but sheer ruthlessness, that unlocks his shackles:

"Now what happens in your typical Murder Weekly story -- or Hindi film, for that matter? A poor man kills a rich man. Good. Then he takes the money. Good. But then he gets dreams in which the dead man pursues him with bloody fingers, saying Mur-der-er, mur-der-er.

"Doesn't happen like that in real life. Trust me. ...

"The real nightmare you get is the other kind. You toss about in the bed dreaming that you haven't done it -- that you lost your nerve and let Mr. Ashok get away -- that you're still in Delhi, still the servant of another man, and then you wake up."

Later, reflecting on an accident in which one of his own employees kills a poor young man, he is defiantly unrepentant:

"And it was not his fault. Not mine either. Our outsourcing companies are so cheap that they force their taxi operators to promise them an impossible number of runs every night. To meet such schedules, we have to drive recklessly; we have to keep hitting and hurting people on the roads. It's a problem every taxi operator in this city faces. Don't blame me."

If that's not enough to make western captains of industry squirm in their leather office chairs, his final speech to Wen should more than do the trick:

"Am I not a part of all that is changing in this country? Haven't I succeeded in the struggle that every poor man here should be making -- the struggle not to take the lashes your father took, not to end up in a mound of indistinguishable bodies that will rot in the black mud of Mother Ganga? True, there was the matter of murder -- which is a wrong thing to do, no question about it. It has darkened my soul. All the skin-whitening creams sold in the markets of India won't clean my hands again.

"But isn't it likely that everyone who counts in this world, including our prime minister (including you, Mr. Jiabao) has killed someone or other on their way to the top? Kill enough people and they will put up bronze statues to you near Parliament House in Delhi -- but that is glory, and not what I am after. All I wanted was the chance to be a man -- and for that, one murder was enough."