I am not really an "Ohio Lit Blogger" in that I report on the literary scene - such as it is - Columbus or Ohio generally. But I do try to make Ohio connections on occasion and take advantage of them when I can. So when I heard that Dinty W. Moore was going to do a reading at Ohio State I made sure to attend. It turned out to be an enjoyable evening with readings by Dinty and Joe Mackall (I hope to have more about this author soon).
And it further prompted my interest in his book Between Panic and Desire published by the fine folks at the University of Nebraska Press. Here is what Publishers Weekly had to say about the book:
In this unconventional, nonsequential, generational autobiography, AKA cultural memoir, Moore, a professor of English at Ohio University, describes growing up as a child of the 1950s. Panic characterized his youth, as he watched the symbols of safety and security on television—Leave It to Beaver, Father Knows Best—while his real world fell apart. His mother had left his often-inebriated father, but couldn't handle raising the children herself. Paranoia was the theme of his teen years, as JFK and King were assassinated; the draft and the Vietnam War drove young men to extremes; and characters like Charlie Manson, Squeaky Fromme, Mark David Chapman and John Hinckley Jr. all took aim at public figures. Moore's own paranoia was only heightened by using LSD and smoking dope while tooling around in his VW Beetle. Miraculously, desire began to overtake panic; he discovered a passion for writing, which has focused him ever since. Moore lays all this out in a series of free-form, almost playful essays; only there's something serious here, too, as he realizes our history seems to repeat itself: the Patriot Act sounds like 1984 and Iraq feels like Vietnam all over again. In the end, Moore (The Accidental Buddhist) takes readers on a quirky, entertaining joyride.
After the reading I stopped to say hello and he graciously agreed to answer some questions. After some delay I finally managed to send him some and he quickly responded. I offer them below for your enjoyment. I hope to offer a review of Panic and Desire soon. In the meantime perhaps this will pique your interest.
1) When people at parties ask what you do for a living how do you answer?
It depends on the party, of course. I am a writer – I write books – I teach writing. The answer seems to shift. To be honest, I am proud to be the author of five books , but there is always that moment, when you tell a stranger at a party, or on a plane, “I write books,” where they ask the title of one of you books, and if it isn’t a Stephen King or John Grisham blockbuster, they look disappointed. Well, I don’t like that moment.
2) How would you define/describe “creative non-fiction”?
Essentially, creative nonfiction involves bringing the entire literary toolbox – scene, voice, metaphor, lyricism, attitude – to the writing of truth. The creativity comes in the presentation.
3) Are Panic and Desire real towns in PA? Was it really just chance that you found yourself physically in a place you had inhabited metaphorically for a long time?
Yes, they are real. I wouldn’t call it chance – I deliberately veered off the road one morning, out of curiosity, to see what these two towns – crossroads really – looked like. But if you are asking, “Did I know that I would write this book, or that I would land on this metaphor?” No, I didn’t know that at all, it came much later.
Sorry for the blog silence, life and work have me loaded down. I hope to get out from under things soon. In the meantime here are some books to check out.
--> A Voyage Long and Strange: Rediscovering the New World by Tony Horwitz
Kirkus Reviews
Irreverent, effervescent reexamination of early exploration in the Americas by peripatetic, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Horwitz (The Devil May Care: 50 Intrepid Americans and Their Quest for the Unknown, 2003, etc.). What do Americans really know about the discovery of their continent? Visiting the sadly puny Plymouth Rock prompted this energetic, likable author to delve into the historic record and sniff out the real story behind America's creation myth, from one section of the country to the other. The Vikings arrived first around 1000 CE, when Leif Eiriksson settled for a spell in Newfoundland, enjoying the grapes and mild weather before being run off by the native Skraelings. Horwitz sought out the probable descendants of these natives, the Micmac, who invited him to a cleansing ceremony in their sweat lodge. Next, the author studied the mixed-up voyages of Columbus, whose ignorance of the globe led him to believe that the eastern Bahamas, where he first landed, was the Orient.While the Spanish were claiming the Caribbean, Mexico and Peru, Ponce de Le-n, a veteran of Columbus's second voyage, struck Daytona Beach in 1513 and named the land La Florida. Alvar Nu-ez Cabeza de Vaca made inroads through Florida and Texas between 1528 and 1536, while ruthless Hernando de Soto cut throughout the South a pitiless swath of destruction and slaughter of natives. These voyages came long before Sir Walter Raleigh sent English colonists to settle on Roanoke Island, Va., in 1585. By 1540, Francisco Vasquez de Coronado penetrated the Southwest from Mexico in search of fabled cities, and in Florida, a little-known Huguenot settlement established in 1564 at La Caroline was wiped out by Spanishinvaders. The author revisited all of these sites to speak to the locals, who are often as colorful as the forgotten history he was tracking. Accessible to all ages, hands-on and immensely readable, this book invites readers to search out America's story for themselves.
--> The Strong Man: John Mitchell and the Secrets of Watergate by James Rosen
Publishers Weekly
Casting the 66th attorney general and Watergate felon as the most upright man in the Nixon administration is faint praise indeed, to judge by this biography. Fox News correspondent Rosen applauds Mitchell for his tough law-and-order policies, school-desegregation efforts and hard line against leftist radicals, and for enduring wife Martha's alcoholic breakdowns and raving late-night phone calls to reporters. The book's heart is Rosen's meticulous, exhaustively researched study of Mitchell's Watergate role, absolving him of ordering the break-in and most other charges leveled against him. Instead, Mitchell is painted as a force for propriety who was framed by others—especially White House counsel John Dean, who comes off as Watergate's evil genius. (Rosen also claims Watergate burglar James McCord was secretly working for the CIA and deliberately sabotaged the break-in.) Unfortunately, Rosen's salutes to Mitchell's integrity and reverence for the law clash with his accounts of the man's misdeeds: undermining the Paris peace talks, suborning and committing perjury, tolerating the criminal scheming in Nixon's White House and re-election campaign. Mitchell may have blanched at the Nixon administration's sleazy intrigues, as Rosen insists, but he seems not to have risen above them.
--> The Natural History of the Bible by Daniel Hillel
Publishers Weekly
That environmental factors affect our daily lives is disputed by no one. But can environment, climate and topology play a part in the development of a religious community? Hillel, professor emeritus of environmental studies at the University of Massachusetts and senior research scientist at Columbia University's Center for Climate Systems Research, says yes. He comes to the subject immersed in the lore of ancient Israel, from his grandfather's instruction to his own years living in modern Israel. He sees the Jewish belief system as an amalgam of ideas emerging from an interplay of human beings with both the land and its peoples, "absorb[ing] all the cultural strands... from all the ecological domains of the ancient Near East... and assimilat[ing] them into their own culture." He divides sacred history into seven "domains," dispensations based not on some theological construct but rather on the terrain in which the Israelites lived. What emerges is a largely naturalistic explanation of Israel's beliefs and laws, with a strong emphasis on the impact of culture and environment on the evolving Jewish religion. Hillel recounts, in a richly detailed and beautifully told manner, the origins of the Hebrew Bible in a new and satisfying way.
OK, I didn't get to this as fast as I promised, but I wanted to weigh in on the great Kindle debate of 2008.
First let's talk about cost. $400 is a lot of money. I would not have spent the money myself. It was a Christmas gift and a wonderful one. If the price is too high for you I can respect that. I don't really want to get into a debate about whether it is "worth" $400 or not. That is really up to the individual to decide. But considering what people spend on cell phones, PDAs, Mp3 players it doesn't strike me as ridiculously over-priced by any means.
The no brainer type for this device is an avid reader who travels a lot. If you read a lot of bestsellers or popular books and you are on the road a lot the Kindle would be awesome. You can bring an incredible amount of reading material in one handy device that is about the size and weight of a trade paperback. Plus, if for some reason you run out you can buy more instantly. As a bonus you can listen to music and do some basic web surfing. I can't imagine why a book addict traveler wouldn't find the Kindle a wonderful tool.
But I am not a frequent traveler, so why do I love the Kindle? Convenience. The basic advantage is the ability to have access to a wide array of reading material in a small light weight form. With the Kindle it is easy to never be without something to read.
Let's start with books. And let's start with a few caveats:
- Yes, not all books are available. This is a drawback. I wish more books were available. But a lot of books are available and more are being added every day.
- There are still some books I want to read in hard copy format. Books where the illustrations, the look and feel of the book, are part of the process of reading it. But this is a limited set of books so it isn't a big problem. I don't need to read everything on the Kindle just enough to make it worthwhile.
- I really haven't had much trouble inadvertently hitting page forward buttons or anything else. But it does take a little time to get used to handling it given the location of the buttons. At first I thought it would be a problem, but I just seemed to get used to it.
Now on to the positives.
One of the great things about the Kindle is the instant nature of the process. Find out one of your favorite authors just came out with a new book? Buy it on your Kindle and read it seconds later. Imagine if the Kindle was around for the Harry Potter books. The moment the book came out you could start reading it. I find that cool. No running to the store or waiting for Amazon to ship it to you.
More below.
One of my favorites series along these lines is the Sisters Grimm series by Michael Buckley. They are creative, fun, easy reads, with a touch of suspense and have great illustrations. What's not to like?
The latest in the series (book six) has recently come out, and Tales from the Hood is a delightful addition to the sister's adventures.
For those of you unfamiliar with the premise of the series, it is that the famous Brothers Grimm were not capturing folktales and fairy tales but actual history. As the world turns away from believing these stories the magical creatures involved end up sequestered in a sleepy town in upstate New York called Ferryport landing.
The central characters, Daphne and Sabrina Grimm, are long last relatives of the brothers and they end up in the family business: solving the crimes and mysteries of the magical residents of their new home town known as "Everafters." A group of the Everafters known as the Red Hand, however, resent the Grimms for their role in trapping them in Ferryport. They kidnap Daphne and Sabrina's parents and put them in a deep sleep. The arc of the series is driven by the Grimm's quest to rescue and awaken them. Each book resolves a smaller mystery while keeping this over-arching mystery just out of reach and ends with "To Be Continued."
For more on book six see below.
I will address this more fully tomorrow when I have more time, but here are a couple of posts that lay out the two sides:
- Meagan McArdle offers ten reasons why she loves her Kindle
I am not a literary critic. Sure, this blog may be loosely "literary" to the extent I talk about literature. But mostly I am just a person who loves to read and writes what he thinks about books on the internet. I try to honestly communicate what I like and don't like about the books I read. I am comfortable offering my opinion. And in this sense I suppose I am a critic.
I find the idea of writing a novel so daunting, however, as to be almost incomprehensible. I simply can't imagine the work and creative skill involved in making up dialog, creating and describing characters, keeping the plot straight, etc. That is why I love to interact with authors. It is with a sense of awe at what they are able to accomplish. When someone I am in any way connected to writes a book then it makes it that much more interesting.
Mark Sarvas and I are connected by nothing more than the fact that we both have blogs. I have exchanged some emails with him and commented on his blog. We aren't exactly blog soul mates, however. He is a West Coast liberal and I am a Midwest conservative. (In fact, we had something of a falling out during the last election - if it could be called that.)
Nevertheless, he is a talented blogger and a love for books can surely overcome politics. With this in mind, I wanted to read his first novel and genuinely hoped it met with success. And so when it came out I read it.
Feel free to take what I say with whatever amount of salt grains you feel are appropriate. Maybe I am just kissing up to a famous lit blogger. Maybe I want to join that infamous clique and reap the link love that is said to come with it. Maybe I am just not as sophisticated a judge of literature as the New York Times.
But I will admit that I liked the book and even found it moving. It is a comic story about grief, deception, and self-perception.
More after the jump.
Today I recorded a podcast for Redstate and thought I would share it with CM readers. My guests are Tara Ross and Joe Smith authors of Under God: George Washington and the Question of Church and State.
In our conversation we discuss George Washington’s unique perspective on questions of church and state; why his views have not been more widely discussed or understood; how one phrase from one letter from Thomas Jefferson came to dominate American views on the subject; and how we might go about changing this dominance.
I read Ray Blackstone's first novel, Flabbergasted, and found it to be a lighthearted and wholesome novel about dating from a Christian perspective. It lacked depth and much tension, but I wrote at that I could appreciate the perspective:
That being said, Flabbergasted is an interesting read and a family friendly one at that. It is refreshing to read a book that doesn't treat becoming a Christian like joining a weird cult or as a fig leaf for a warped psyche. Given the bias and antagonism that much of our culture has towards faith Blackstone provides a nice counter-balance. He paints a picture of real people living real lives yet doing it in within the context of church and faith. Jay's path to faith may seem a little trite at times but it is honest and sincere. Not everyone needs to go through a "dark night of the soul" to come to faith in Christ.
Blackstone has gone on to write a number of novels including two sequels to Flabbergasted. His latest book, Par for the Course, caught my eye because of its subject matter: golf and politics. I thought it would be interesting to see what Blackstone could do with two of my hobbies.
Here is the set up for the book:
In PAR FOR THE COURSE, Chris Hackett owns and operates Hack's Golf Learning Center, an eccentric golf range in Charleston, SC. Chris jumps at the chance to step up his game when an attractive new student and political correspondent, Molly, suggests that Chris capitalize on the current, highly polarized, presidential election. This pitting of right versus left means even more income, plus a sharp new girlfriend, and soon Chris, his sidekick, Cack, and their unique golf range are the talk of the town . . . until someone takes the political insults too seriously. Will Molly stick around as Chris learns the true meaning of "playing politics"? And will Chris realize how much he wants her to?
Like Flabbergasted, Par for the Course has dating as a focus. And obviously Blackstone is still writing for a Christian perspective. But the faith element is largely missing from the story. Instead it focuses on Chris and his interaction with women.
The hook for the story, having golfers try to hit a specialized golf cart while Cack hurls partisan insults at them is interesting. And Blackstone handles the set up pretty smoothly - although, a plot line about a feminist speaker never really goes anywhere - and adds in some tension when the plan backfires with disastrous results. Before things turn ugly, however, Blackstone delivers some funny moments.
Chris is an interesting character in many ways. A nice guy who couldn't quite make it as a professional golfer who really wants a family but lacks confidence when it comes to the opposite sex. Blackstone uses him to explore the discussion men have about relationships as well as the challenges of dating and career.
But like Flabbergasted, the question comes down to one of taste (I feel like a broken record on this point). If you are looking for lighthearted, squeaky clean, and slightly cheesy fare then you will probably enjoy Par for the Course.
If you prefer your fiction a little deeper and with a more literary bent then you will probably be disappointed. Blackstone avoids dark or difficult topics and wraps everything up in a nice happy bow. His style makes for a quick read and his main characters are likable if corny. But, IMHO, they require little of the reader and don't make much of an impact.
To me they are Christian fluff, pleasant and family friendly, but fluff nonetheless.
At first glance you might think that Girl Factory by Jim Krusoe is just another story about a lovable loser. Or, maybe it is another one of those unreliable narrators. Or maybe it is a subtle political statement about the objectification of women. In fact, it might be all of these things. But to me it is about the role of perception and self-deception in our lives.
Allow me to steal PW's plot summary:
In the basement of a Southern California yogurt shop one hot summer night, Jonathan, a down-on-his-luck fro-yo slinger, discovers several young, beautiful naked women encased in glass and suspended lifelessly in a milky mixture. Jonathan's boss, Spinner, catches him nosing around and reveals his experiment: acidophilus, yogurt's active culture, has the uncanny ability to preserve and nourish life, he explains, and the women bobbing before Jonathan's wide eyes are making "an investment in their future." When foul play suddenly makes the women Jonathan's wards, he has to see if he has the right stuff to care for them-and perhaps free them.
This is a succinct plot summation and it gives you an idea of the comic nature of the story. But the real focus of the novel is Jonathan's inability to do anything right and the flawed perception and self-deception that is at the root of his problems.
Jonathan is certainly an unreliable narrator. He presents each of his actions and decisions as rational and well intentioned even as each ends in disaster and failure. At the start of the story, Jonathan sets out to save a dog unjustly imprisoned and facing euthanasia. Despite his good intentions, however, this rescue attempt ends in death and mayhem and the release of a dangerous and vicious dog.
Once he finds the women in the basement, Jonathan once again proceeds with a plan to rescue them and once again things end badly. This is a pattern in his life. In fact, one of the women suspended in yogurt resembles a girlfriend Jonathan may or may not have left on the side of the road in Mexico.
Jonathan as lovable loser provides some comic moments. You have to chuckle as he tries to manage the increasing mess he has made of his life with only the feeblest of mental and social skills. As things come crashing down around him he seems convinced he is just one lucky break away from solving his problems.
What made Girl Factory more intriguing, at least for me, was whether Jonathan was really a bumbling idiot or whether there was something a little more sinister at work. Is he just stupid - unable to see his lame ideas and rationalizations for what they are - or is he really a sort of psychopath who rationalizes his violence by acting like everything is just an honest mistake or misunderstanding?
Jonathan beans an employee at the dog shelter with a crowbar, plays a role in the death of the women in the yogurt shop basement, and might have abandoned his girlfriend in the middle of nowhere while on a road trip in Mexico. You don't have to be a conspiracy theory nut to wonder if the bodies pilling up around Jonathan are more than just accidents.
And all of this is wrapped up in this comic, almost absurd, story about women suspended in yogurt and whether Jonathan can resuscitate them with some combination of soap and water. Krusoe never reveals the answer to any of the questions but lets the reader attempt to work it out on their own.
And let's be honest, Krusoe may take things to an absurd level, but I think we can all admit that perception plays a huge role in our lives and it isn't always easy to spot the difference between harmless rationalization and dangerous self-deception.
However you come down on what the story is really about, Girl Factory is certainly entertaining. And short enough to be considered a novella, with a quick and engaging style, it is a quick read. Its wry humor and insightful descriptions of human nature and American culture will bring a smile to your face and occasionally a chuckle.
But I bet it will also leave you pondering what it was really all about.
I am either generous in giving author's the benefit of the doubt or I am a glutton for punishment. After two rather inconclusive takes on David Gregory's books I decided to give it one more shot. This time with The Next Level. This is labeled "A Parable of Finding Your Place in Life." Having recently gone through considerable chaos in my professional life I thought this book might strike a chord. I have to say I was disappointed.
It isn't that The Next Level is horrible or unreadable or something, it is a quick read, but rather it just left me uninspired and with no real insights.
Here is the publishers description:
Business degree in hand, Logan enters the immense Universal Systems building and is hired as an organizational analyst — a trouble-shooter. His job: evaluate the company’s five divisions, each on a separate level and each operating on startlingly unique principles. Which set of principles is successful? Why is most of the company’s profit generated by one tiny division? What is real profit, anyway? And who is the enigmatic executive that Logan ends up reporting to?Logan engages in a life-changing pursuit for The Next Level–a fascinating parable that will help you answer some of life’s most perplexing and vital questions. Joining Logan in evaluating each level’s approach, you’ll be inspired to consider the big picture of your own life from an entirely different perspective — one that holds the key to life’s ultimate purpose. No matter where you are now, get ready to embark on your own passionate pursuit of The Next Level.
As I noted above, the book is a quick read and Gregory keeps things move at a good pace. There is a mystery involved as Logan proceeds through the levels and that keeps the readers interest as well. Gregory's conception of the stages of Christian faith as a corporation is an interesting one. The process of Logan evaluating each level does provide some thought provoking ideas about how you approach your faith.
But as with the other books, this one just feels thin. Not in terms of length, although that is obviously true, but in terms of depth. In reading the book nothing jumped out as me as particularly insightful or interesting. It has too much of a paint-by-numbers feel to it; a rout translation of an idea into a fictional setting.
In order for a parable or fable to work it needs to bring something in the telling that can't be communicated through a straightforward explanation; it is supposed to explore the issue from a fresh direction. I just didn't get that from The Next Level.
