Summertime and the Reading is Easy, Part II

Part 1 covered June, Part 2 July. Maybe I'll get Part 3 done (and posted) before summer is over (and you can interpret that as either the end of August or when fall starts on September 22nd). ( :

The Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee Stewart
Carrie has written about her love for this series many times, and I'm glad to have finally embarked on the journey. This book is clever, intriguing, and full of adventure that any child (or adult) should enjoy. I especially liked the mind puzzles and the way the characters' strengths and weaknesses complemented one another perfectly. I think my daughter could handle the reading level now, but I'm going to wait a few more years to introduce her to this series when she should be better able to enjoy the subtleties of the narrative.

The Distant Land of My Father by Bo Caldwell
After reading City of Tranquil Light, I was curious about this previous novel by the same author. To be quite honest, I think that it is hardly worth comparing the two. While they both include an insider's perspective on the changes in China throughout the 20th century, this one is told through the experiences of a very dysfunctional family, dysfunctional and disrupted mostly due to the husband and father who loved Shanghai and the easy money he could make there more than his wife and daughter. His selfishness brought many tragic consequences, and while there was a bit of redemption at the end, it really struck me as too little too late - at least in terms of making it a meaningful story for me.

On a side note, I did a bit more research about the author, and found this very interesting first-person account of her life and conversion to Roman Catholicism. I'm sad that her faith is so shaped by experience, believing as I do that the Scriptures and sound doctrine provide a much more stable foundation. But after much consideration, I've decided that it does not diminish my opinion of City of Tranquil Light, for the faith of the characters in that book is tried and genuine. It's obviously not a book that is meant to teach doctrine, but insofar as it speaks of God and the Christian life, I still think it presents a accurate picture.

Plain Truth by Jodi Picoult
I didn't like it, but it was one of those books that I had to keep reading just to see what happened. I even lost sleep over it, staying up late because it was so hard to put down. But I still didn't like it, not one little bit. Like most modern novels it included too much information about intimate relationships between unmarried men and women. And the ending - well, it was just unnecessary. At least everyone in my book club agreed with this consensus, and we're returning to 19th century classics for our next selection!

The Penderwicks: A Summer Tale of Four Sisters, Two Rabbits, and a Very Interesting Boy by Jeanne Birdsall
If you haven't noticed, I have to do some therapeutic reading after I've read a book that leaves a a bad taste in my mouth. So I had checked this one out from the library as an option for my daughter (I like to have a wide variety of titles for her to choose from) and decided that "a summer story about four sisters, two rabbits, and a very interesting boy" would be just the thing after the Picoult novel, not to mention that I love the cover art! It was certainly light and easy, and the characters were written so that I felt I knew them quite quickly. On the downside, one thread of the story involved a pre-teen crush on an older boy. Disobedience and lying were justified by a positive outcome or by the meanness of the adult making the rules. So I won't be handing this to my 8-year-old anytime soon. In a few more years, she can read it, and we'll talk through the issues, for there were certainly many fun and funny parts, too.

Thunderstorm in Church by Louise A. Vernon
See my earlier comments on two other books by the same author which we read aloud earlier in the summer, as this one was very similar and my opinions haven't improved any. This one was interesting for the glimpses into life in Luther's busy household, but the dialogue... {shudder}

Summertime, and the Reading is Easy, Part I

We took a family vacation in June, which meant that I got more reading time than usual! It also meant that many of my reading selections were a little on the lighter side, but I would still highly recommend several of them.

City of Tranquil Light by Bo Caldwell
Every so often, I open a book and find a sense of quietness and purpose - perhaps holiness is the word I'm looking for - that makes me take a deep breath and settle in for refreshment, encouragement, and challenge to a greater life of faith. Most often, I think this happens with biographies, so to find a novel that evokes this deep satisfaction is truly rare (Stepping Heavenward is the only other that I can recall). But City of Tranquil Light is one of those special books, one that I borrowed from the library and then ordered two copies (one to keep and one to give away) before I was halfway through, and I've ordered eight more since then. I could tell you more, but I'd rather you just borrowed or bought your own copy and savored it yourself! I usually don't promote book purchases here, but as of this writing, Amazon has hardback copies of this book for the bargain price of $2.74, and I believe you would find that to be money well spent! (You can follow the links to Amazon from either the book's picture or title.)

Enna Burning by Shannon Hale
This second installment in the "Books of Bayern" series from Shannon Hale was much darker than The Goose Girl, and I didn't enjoy it nearly as much. I suppose it's a story of friendship, a coming of age story laced with a great deal of pride and lack of self-control, and there is really nothing unusual in those themes in young-adult literature, though the fact that something is common does not mean I should condone it. I'm not sure if the author intended for there to be any moral lessons or analogies, but when I started trying to think through the implications of some of the imagery, it seemed far too pantheistic for me to even want to explore those trains of thought. Maybe that's why it left me with such an unsettled feeling, and why I finished it simply to be done, not because I enjoyed it.

The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency by Alexander McCall Smith
I've seen recommendations for this series by Alexander McCall Smith on many blogs, and my daughter has enjoyed listening to his mysteries for kids. So when I found this at a children's consignment store (of all places!), I added it to my summer vacation reading bag. I've said before that mysteries are my favorite genre, but I do prefer full-length novels to short stories. I like a very well-developed plot, though I will make an exception for Sherlock Holmes (who wouldn't!). At any rate, this initially seemed very disjointed, as the chapters jumped back and forth between Mma Ramotswe's family history and various cases she'd solved more recently. Eventually, a case develops that somewhat ties everything together, but overall it just wasn't my cup of tea. I'll stick with Lord Peter Wimsey and Brother Cadfael when I need my mystery fix.

Royal Children of English History by Edith Nesbit
Have I mentioned that I have a Kindle? It will never replace real books for me, but the free classics and public domain works are lots of fun to explore. (All of L. M. Montgomery's short stories for free? Yes, please!) So this was a short little book that I read as a bonus for our book club's "British Royalty" theme in June. I expected it to be stories from the childhoods of various kings & queens, but it was more a children's history, a simple retelling of the most common anecdotes or deeds of valor of notable English princes or kings. I'm sure my children would enjoy this as a read-aloud if I could fit it into the schedule.

The Little White Horse by Elizabeth Goudge
This is a very sweet fairy tale set in a secluded valley of Victorian England with good guys, bad guys, and some highly intelligent and helpful animals. There is a very large "dog," who turns out to be a lion, but that is the extent of any parallels to Narnia, I think. There is not much grace or redemption, but only trying very hard to be good, which I would consider a bit overly idealistic if I were reading this only for instruction in morality. That is not the only purpose of a good story, however, and I appreciated the beautiful descriptions and gentle blend of fantasy and reality. I must say that I find an old-fashioned morality tale to be much more enjoyable than many modern novels that include too little morals and too much information, so you can read this one without regrets.

Read-alouds:
The Beggars' Bible and Ink on His Fingers by Louise A. Vernon
These are interesting for their historical perspective, but the story line is extremely repetitive - a young boy is distressed (obsessed) about what he will do when he grows up then crosses paths with a historical figure (John Wycliffe and Johann Gutenberg, in these books) and finds direction for his life. They are heavy on dialogue, and that dialogue is often forced and stilted. The author seems to have done her research thoroughly, but her use of anecdotes and dialogue is extremely awkward. I'm glad we read them aloud, as my kids probably learned more than reading them on their own, but all of us found it challenging to stay interested at times.

The Fantastic Flying Journey by Gerald Durrell
This is an imaginative story about an eccentric uncle who takes his niece and twin nephews on a trip around the world in an amazing and well-equipped hot air balloon. The purpose of the trip is to find Uncle Lancelot's brother, a naturalist, so they follow his trail and meet many animals in their natural habitats around the world. This one is both fun and educational, and my daughter finished it ahead of my reading it aloud, so I know she liked it a lot. I was pleased that it did not have an overt evolutionary slant. In fact, I can't recall if there were any allusions to evolution, but that could be my faulty memory. We found this at our library book sale, and we highly recommend it!

Shanghai Girls by Lisa See

I read Lisa See's other historical novels, Snow Flower and the Secret Fan and Peony in Love, earlier this year and quickly became a fan of her detailed and personal writing style and intense character development. I also enjoyed learning so much about Chinese history and culture from her novels. So I reserved this book at the library before it even hit the shelves, and then I got to enjoy that "new book" smell and feel as the first one to check it out - what fun!

Shanghai Girls is historical fiction, but it deals with more modern ideas and the shaping of Chinese-American culture as opposed to ancient Chinese beliefs and traditions, which is to be expected since it is set in the 1930's to 1960's and over half the story takes place in California. I like old things, and it seems that modernity brings with it a more blatant acknowledgement of sin, which colors the novels even if its not flagrantly described. "The Old Chinese City still has temples and gardens, but the rest of Shanghai kneels before the gods of trade, wealth, industry, and sin" (12), and the same could be said for Los Angeles once the sisters Pearl and May arrive there, only the Chinese are mostly sequestered in China City or Chinatown trying to eke out enough to live and stay anonymous to the government.

It was interesting to read of the presence of Christian missionaries both in China and Chinatown, but somewhat sad to read of the way many Chinese used their services simply for personal advancement or to have the right political connections. The main character did become a "one-Goder," as the Chinese-Americans referred to Christians, but it seemed primarily a means of personal comfort as she added prayer to the old Chinese superstitions and religious practices.

There were certainly enlightening aspects of this novel, especially the scrutiny and fear under which the Chinese lived in America not so many decades ago. On the other hand, perhaps the close proximity to the time and culture made the character development not quite as rich or insightful as See's other novels. It seemed more like I was simply observing the events that unfolded around the characters rather than understanding how they thought or why they reacted in the ways they did. So for several reasons, this is probably my least favorite of the three See novels I have read, but it was still very interesting and a learning experience about another time, place, and life very unlike my own.

Like Lisa See's other historical novels, there is a distinctively tragic element to the plot, though not without moments of happiness. The main character, Pearl, is shaped by life events and petty jealousies with her sister May that lead to misunderstandings and mistakes, somewhat similar to the plot of Snow Flower and the Secret Fan. Apart from the history, it is a story about relationships, and how one's short-sightedness and selfishness can shape the course of one's life.

Finally, I thought the ending was a bit too abrupt - I was really surprised to turn the page and find Acknowledgements instead of another chapter. Maybe she has a sequel in mind...

Peony in Love by Lisa See

A love story. . .a ghost story. . .a tragedy. . .a history. . .a myth. . . Peony in Love by Lisa See crosses many conventional categories to tell a fictionalized account of the writing of the Three Wives' Commentary of The Peony Pavilion, an 18th century work that expounded a 16th century Chinese Opera.

The actual opera, The Peony Pavilion, tells the story of a young girl who dies for her dreams of love, only to be brought back to life by her dream lover who falls in love with her painted image and spirit. Almost seventy years after the opera was written, Peony, a well-educated girl from a wealthy family, has read and collected numerous manuscripts of The Peony Pavilion. By her sixteenth birthday, she is quite obsessed with the idea of love and chaffs at the thought of an arranged marriage. When her father stages a production of the opera at their family compound, Peony is smitten not only with the beauty and imagery of the story, but also with a handsome young man that she meets first by accident and twice more in secret, against all expectations of propriety. In the following weeks and months, Peony's life begins to mirror that of the opera's heroine as she becomes a lovesick maiden, refusing to eat and spending what little strength she has in writing poetry and comments in the margins of The Peony Pavilion. Tragically, Peony dies just days before her marriage, when her dreams of love might really have been fulfilled, and the reader is transported to the mysterious world of the Chinese afterlife. As a ghost, Peony learns more about her family history and her husband's ongoing life. She learns more about herself and human nature as she tries to reconcile her own difficulties and help those she loves.

Like Snow Flower and the Secret Fan (click title to read my review), Peony in Love depicts the life of a woman in ancient China, and through her story, we learn many details about the history and culture of this ancient land. The two novels are very different in content, but actually quite similar in theme. One chronicles a very long life, while the other deals mainly with the afterlife. But both stories recount the heroine's quest for true love, the intricacies of family relationships, the unfortunate consequences of misinformation and misunderstandings, and above all a woman's need to be heard. In each novel, words, particularly the written word, hold the key to a woman's freedom within the constraints of a very traditional and regimented society.

Every mother is afraid for her daughter, but I was terrified. I could only think of all the terrible things that could happen. But what's the worst thing that could happen? . . .The worst thing was losing you. But look what you've done these past years. Look at what your love for Wu Ren has caused to flower in you. . .Your grandmother and I, and so many other women, had wanted to be heard. We went out and it started to happen for us. Then the only time I was really heard - the poem on the wall - I wanted to die. But you're different. In death, you've grown to be an admirable woman. And then there's your project. (241)

I thought Snow Flower excelled in character development, while Peony had more satisfying closures to the various threads of the story. But I would be hard pressed to choose which novel I enjoyed more - both were fascinating, insightful, and rich in historical detail, each in unique ways.

I am impressed with Lisa See's ability to transport the reader to another time and place and incorporate so many historical details in a compelling and personal narrative. I look forward to reading her next historical novel about Chinese women, Shanghai Girls, and her family memoir, On Gold Mountain: The One-Hundred-Year Odyssey of My Chinese-American Family, looks interesting, as well.

Red Scarf Girl by Ji-Li Jiang

Red Scarf Girl: A Memoir of the Cultural Revolution was the March selection for Captive Thoughts Book Club. As young adult non-fiction, it was easier reading than our usual fare, but it provided us with plenty to discuss and much to learn about the Cultural Revolution of China. Since another member has already summarized our discussion, I'll provide a brief summary of the memoir itself and my own thoughts.

Ji-li Jiang was twelve years old in 1966 when Chairman Mao began the tumultuous Cultural Revolution, a period of persecution and upheaval that was presented as a great ideology but was mostly political maneuvering. Since her deceased grandfather was a landlord, her family is on the black list, which results in the Red Guards searching and ransacking her apartment, her father's imprisonment and persecution, and her being ostracized at school and encouraged to denounce her family. Ji-li is confused by conflicting emotions and divided loyalties. She wants to do well in school and succeed personally, but at the same time loves her family and knows that it is not right for them to suffer so much for her grandfather's past. Eventually, she comes to a crisis and must decide where her loyalties really lie.

This memoir was informative, but in a very limited way. The Cultural Revolution is described from the perspective of one child in a particular family, and most of her experiences are related on an emotional level, which is necessarily selective in its details. The glossary at the back was very helpful for orienting one to the historical and political figures and movements that are mentioned. I think this might be better read along with a basic history of the Cultural Revolution - a more straightforward history would provide the framework in which this very personal account could be better appreciated and understood.

Another friend who read this book commented that it had scary parallels with what is currently happening in America. I tried to find some of those parallels as I read, and what seemed most obvious was the adoration and blind devotion of the young people for Chairman Mao. At one point, Ji-li relates attending a rally where a girl told of her opportunity to see Chairman Mao at Tienanmen Square. "'. . . I am very lucky to have had such an experience,' she said. 'I have resolved to dedicate my whole life to Chairman Mao and the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. I will give every drop of blood in my body to work to liberate all of mankind'" (107-108). Those sentiments remind me of the fervor that surrounded Obama before the election last November. I must admit that I am sadly uninformed about current events, so I didn't pick up on other parallels. However, I think Western individualism almost precludes such a blind following of a national hero and establishment of a national identity as what happened in China's Cultural Revolution. Perhaps, though, I should try to be more knowledgeable of current events to ensure that I am not merely an ignorant participant in my community and country.

Teaser Tuesdays - Peony in Love

TEASER TUESDAYS asks you to:

1. Grab your current read. Let the book fall open to a random page.
   
2. Share with us two (2) “teaser” sentences from that page, somewhere between lines 7 and 12.
3. You also need to share the title of the book that you’re getting your “teaser” from … that way people can have some great book recommendations if they like the teaser you’ve given! Please avoid spoilers!

My project would be my salvation in the coming dark years. I might be locked in my husband's home, but my mind would travel to the Moon-Viewing Pavilion, where I could meet my poet again and again without interruption or fear of being caught.

~ p. 77 Peony in Love by Lisa See.

Reviewed 3/30/09 here.

Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress by Dai Sijie

To put it simply, I wasn't impressed with Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress. Maybe it seemed shallow after the rich descriptions and character development in Snow Flower and the Secret Fan. Or maybe I just didn't care for the coming-of-age exploits of two boys in their late teens.

Perhaps my expectations were too high. From the back cover, I had gathered that the story revolved around the impact of Western literature on two Chinese boys during the Cultural Revolution when Chairman Mao attempted to equalize and redefine class status by sending countless numbers of city children to work among peasants in the countryside and mountainous regions of China. While I did learn about some of the hardships and injustices of the rural re-education program, the effects of Western literature were much less redeeming than I had anticipated. In the words of the narrator, "...we were seduced, overwhelmed, spellbound by the mystery of the outside world, especially the world of women, love and sex as revealed to us by these Western writers..." (109). Granted, the narrator also learned the concept of Western individualism, without which he would have remained "incapable of grasping the notion of one man standing up against the whole world" (110). But even his new found individualism was only employed to further his dreams of women, love, and sex, and, unfortunately, to deal with the consequences of his friends' freedom and experimentation in those categories.

In summary, the historical aspects were interesting, but I'm sure there are other novels or non-fiction accounts that convey the circumstances and effects of the Cultural Revolution with a story-line less driven by testosterone. Another friend who read this book suggested that it might be more of an allegory, a subtle cultural commentary on the ideas of freedom, individualism, and knowledge. I might have enjoyed it more if I had been looking for those deeper threads, but they do indeed run deep, and the surface story was too superficial for my tastes.

Snow Flower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See

Snow Flower and the Secret Fan is an amazing novel. It incorporates a vast amount of history and cultural details about rural China in the early to mid-1800's. But in a stellar example of historical fiction, the author, Lisa See, seamlessly weaves these details throughout the life story of Lily, a farmer's daughter whose perfectly bound feet earn her a passage out of poverty to become the wife of the eldest son of one of most wealthy and influential families in the county. But the rags-to-riches tale is only the backdrop for an even more moving story of the relationship between Lily and Snow Flower, her laotong, or "old same," a girl whose birth date and other characteristics matched so perfectly that they were united in friendship for life. Like other women in ancient China, the girls learn a secret language, nu shu, by which they communicate when they are apart and with which they record the significant events of their lives on a fan that they share between them.

Lily encapsulates the uniqueness of a laotong relationship by reflecting on love and the place of women in Chinese culture: "We may love our daughters with all our hearts, but we must train them through pain. We love our sons most of all, but we can never be a part of their world, the outer realm of men. We are expected to love our husbands from the day of Contracting a Kin, though we will not see their faces for another six years. We are told to love our in-laws, but we enter those families as strangers, as the lowest person in the household, just one step on the ladder about a servant. We are ordered to love and honor our husbands' ancestors, so we perform the proper duties, even if our hearts quietly call out gratitude to our natal ancestors. We love our parents because they take care of us, but we are considered worthless branches on the family tree. We drain the family resources. We are raised by one family for another. As happy as we are in our natal families, we all know that parting is inevitable. So we love our families, but we understand that this love will end in the sadness of departure. All these types of love come out of duty, respect, and gratitude. Most of them, as the women in my county know, are sources of sadness, rupture, and brutality. But the love between a pair of old sames is something completely different...a laotong relationship is made by choice" (59-60).

Many parts of the novel were brutally honest and painful to read, such as the descriptions of foot binding, the general condition and treatment of women, and the untimely deaths of so many. Conversely, there were points of great beauty and love revealed in family relations and friendships. The author often foreshadows some of the significant crises of the novel, revealing just enough for the reader to take notice, but not enough to fully reveal the plot. For example, early in the novel, we read, "Always Aunt cautioned us to be careful with our words, since by using phonetic characters, as opposed to the pictographic characters of men's writing, our meanings could become lost or confused. 'Every word must be placed in context,' she reminded us each day the end of our lesson. 'Much tragedy could result from a wrong reading'" (69).

Tragedy does indeed come to Lily and Snow Flower through a misreading of nu shu, but for many years they use it to deepen their friendship and survive the challenges of their circumstances. When early in their married lives, Snow Flower breaks with traditional phrases and shares the truth of her situation and feelings, Lily realizes "the true purpose of our secret writing. It was not to compose girlish notes to each other or even to introduce us to the women in our husbands' families. It was to give us a voice. Our nu shu was a means for our bound feet to carry us to each other, for our thoughts to fly across the fields as Snow Flower had written. The men in our households never expected us to have anything important to say. They never expected us to have emotions or express creative thoughts" (160).

This is a story of self-discovery, of learning one's own strengths and weaknesses through fellowship with another. It is a story of regret that some of those lessons were learned too late or all too imperfectly: "it's hard to be truly generous and behave in a forthright manner when you don't know how" (247). It is a story of expectations and disappointments, a story of love and loyalty mixed with jealousy and bitterness, a story about the importance of words, and it ends with these most humble and powerful words, "Please forgive me" (253). Lisa See has crafted a rare novel, one that not only reveals the history and culture of an ancient people, but also shows the frailties of the human heart in any time and culture.