Sunday Salon: The Berry Edition

The family outside the Paramount: Six--The Musical. Fun day!

Weather: Cooler with a wind announcing a change from the hot temperatures we've had the past few days. Tomorrow it is supposed to be quite a bit cooler with possible rain. That will be nice.

Berries galore: Saturday my hubby, daughter, and I headed out to the local farmer's market in hopes of finding berries and cherries. We live in berry country with strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, boysenberries, and later in the summer, blackberries all available and they all grow here nicely. But one has to be prepared to pounce. When they are ready, they are ready and the seasons are short. We nearly got caught off guard by the lateness of the strawberry season but we remembered to check in time. Whew.

On our trek to the farmer's market we hoped we would find raspberries for freezer jam, and cherries (I know, cherries aren't berries) for homemade pie filling. We were in luck. We got three half-flats of raspberries (18 pints), three pints of boysenberries (if you've never had them, they are wonderful) and three pints of blueberries. We found the cherries at our local grocery store and purchased 4 1/2 pounds of Bings (the dark purple ones.) We scurried home and got to work. While Carly started mixing up batches of low-sugar freezer raspberry jam, I started pitting the cherries to make the pie filling to freeze so we can make cherry pies for Thanksgiving dinner in November. The kitchen looked like a murder scene with red cherry juice droplets everywhere that looked like blood. Ha! At this point my hubby went to work. We call him Kitchen FEMA. While we make messes, he cleans up in our wake. Altogether we ---

• Made three batches of raspberry jam ready for the freezer (14 jars)
• Squished up the fruit for one more batch to be made some time in the future, bagged it up for the freezer.
• Pitted all the cherries and made two batches of pie filling to freeze.
• Made one batch of boysenberry pie filling to freeze.
• Made a family favorite dessert for after dinner: Peach-a-berry cobbler, with extra cherries and boysenberries thrown in from the extra pie filling batches.
• Washed all the blueberries and bagged them up to freeze.
• Divvied up the extra raspberries so we could all have berries with our breakfast cereal.
• Whew! I had no idea when I got up on Saturday morning that my day would be spent in the kitchen frantically dealing with wonderful berries before they spoiled. 
• 🫐🍓🍒🫐🍓🍒🫐🍓🍒🫐🍓🍒🫐🍓🍒🫐🍓🍒🫐🍓🍒🫐🍓🍒

Six: The Musical -- We just got back from Seattle where we attended a matinee showing of Six: The Musical -- the story of Henry VIII's six wives. If you don't know the premise -- each wife gets a chance to make the case why she deserves to be crowned the wife who suffered the most. Each of the six sing in different musical styles in "queenspirations" by current female musical artists. The energy in the room and strong the feminist message really surprised me. See it if you get a chance!

From the program -- Catherine of Aragon, the first wife. Her queenspirations: Beyonce and Shakira

Fireworks collage: I forgot to share this collage last week. I took all these fabulous photos while watching the 4th of July fireworks over Lake Union in Seattle...only thing, I was watching the show on TV! Ha!

• 

Books/Reading/Blogging:

• Completed this week
• The Last Thing He Told Me by Laura Dave. A Mystery/thriller. I understand it has already been serialized on Apple TV. Now I will look for it.
• In the Great Green Room: The Brilliant and Bold Life of Margaret Wise Brown by Amy Gary. A biography of the author of Goodnight Moon.
• Currently reading
• Frankenstein by Mary Shelley. I thought I knew the story but I guess I know the story of Young Frankenstein by Mel Brooks. Ha! 60%.
• Victory City by Salmon Rushdie. Don and I are listening to this fantasy creation story on audiobook. 30%.
• Blog posts (hyperlinked):
• Planet Book Tag...all nine planets inspire certain books
• Review: Starfish
• Let's Discuss -- Where to post reviews
• Review: It's All Absolutely Fine
• TTT: Pulitzer Prize Winners I May Want to Read

Look what I found this week to amuse/amaze you:

1. The 2023 Finnish Hobbyhorse Championship, including Dressage. If you don't have Twitter I don't think you can see this, but it is real and I think, funny.  (But on the other hand, at least these people are getting exercise and doing something, not sitting around.)

Finnish Hobby Horse Championships 2023 pic.twitter.com/9j6r06qLZO

— Dr Paula Leach (@drPLeach) July 10, 2023

2. This: Hoist the Colors by VoicePlay. Listen long enough to hear the incredible bass voice of Geoff Castellucci. I just discovered this a cappella group this week, though they've been around for years. Enjoy!

3.

-Anne

Planet Book Tag

Planet Book Tag: I got the idea for this book tag from @Haylee.reads (Instagram) and A Great Read (Blogger)

All of my answers are books read in 2023 only. There may be better answers from previous years but this way you'll see what I've been reading THIS year and I won't have to search too far back.

Mercury: Best Written

Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver. Every single book she's written, I've loved. Her writing earned her a Pulitzer Prize this year. (Read in January.)

Venus: Prettiest Cover

These Precious Days: Essays by Ann Patchett. I love the cover, both the front and the back, and the essay about the artist and why Patchett couldn't decide which painting to use, so she used both! (First book completed in 2023.)

Earth: Where I'd Live

Four Seasons in Rome by Anthony Doerr. The first time I visited Rome in 2012 I told my husband we needed to figure out a way to live here for more than a few weeks. Why not a year or more? I'd love it. (Read in May.)

Mars: Worst Villain

The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay by Michael Chabon. The villains in this marvelous story are Nazis! (Need I say more?) [Started Mid-March, finished late-April.]

Jupiter: Longest Read

The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas. The version I read was 1055 pages long, but many other editions weigh in at over 1200 pages. (Started in January, finished the end of March.)

Saturn: Difficult Read

The Road by Cormac McCarthy. Such a bleak story set in a post-apocalypse world. (Read in February.)

Uranus: Changed My Life

Queer Ducks (and Other Animals): The Natural World of Animal Sexuality by Eliot Schrefer. This book opened my eyes to the varying degrees of sexuality in both animals and humans. It would be widely read but I fear it will be widely banned these days. 😒(Finished July 1st.)

Neptune: Made Me Cry

Starfish by Lisa Fipps. Ellie is fat-shamed by classmates and family members, including her mother. It brought back memories of similar stuff happening to me as a kid and I cried for myself and the character in this book. (Just finished.)

Pluto (dwarf planet): Powerful MC

The Mountains Sing by Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai. I interpreted this topic about a powerful MC as the best audiobook narrator I've listened to this year. Quyen Gno narrated this book set in Vietnam. Hearing her narration brought the Vietnamese language/words alive for my ears. It is appropriate that this answer belongs to a dwarf planet since audiobook narrators don't often get the love they deserve. (Listened to in April.)

-Anne

Review and quotes: STARFISH

Title: Starfish by Lisa Fipps

Book Beginnings/First Line Friday quote:

FOR JUST A WHILE

I step into the pool.

The water is bathwater warm

but feels cool

compared to the blisteringly hot air/

Kick. Gliiiiiide.

Stroke. Gliiiiide.//

I am weightless.

Limitless.

For just a while.

Friday56 quote:

TUG-OF-WAR

It's never a good sign when

they pick the fat girl first in gym.

We're playing tug-o-war.

War is a fitting name since 

middle school's one big battlefield

Summary:

Ever since Ellie wore a whale swimsuit and made a big splash at her fifth birthday party, she’s been bullied about her weight. To cope, she tries to live by the Fat Girl Rules–like “no making waves,” “avoid eating in public,” and “don’t move so fast that your body jiggles.” And she’s found her safe space–her swimming pool–where she feels weightless in a fat-obsessed world. In the water, she can stretch herself out like a starfish and take up all the room she wants. It’s also where she can get away from her pushy mom, who thinks criticizing Ellie’s weight will motivate her to diet. Fortunately, Ellie has allies in her dad, her therapist, and her new neighbor, Catalina, who loves Ellie for who she is. With this support buoying her, Ellie might finally be able to cast aside the Fat Girl Rules and starfish in real life–by unapologetically being her own fabulous self.

Review: Starfish by Lisa Fipps won a Printz Honor in 2022. It is a novel-in-verse whose target audience is the young end of YA, say 6-8th graders, though kids as young as ten and as old as fifteen would likely enjoy or relate to it.

When I was young I was the largest kid in my class. How do I know? They weighed us and made us put our weight on a paper to be displayed in front of the whole class. I wasn't huge but I was certainly embarrassed, even as a third grader, to be singled out for this distinction. Later that year I overheard a conversation between a doctor and my mother about my weight. The doctor's suggestions centered around depriving me, but not other people in my family, of treats and desserts. I pictured myself eating a carrot while everyone munched on cake or cookies. Not only was I the largest kid in my class, I was the only fat person in my family, which brought me to tears with the shame of it. Often during meals if I wanted seconds or between meals if I wanted a snack my mother would remind me that it wasn't a good idea to eat/want more. I got pretty good at sneaky eating. I didn't want my mother to know and then have her make another comment about my weight.

As I started reading Starfish, I realized I was the Ellie in my family and it broke my heart for her and for young me. Ellie was always chubby but instead of siding with her and quieting the teasing from siblings, Ellie's mother fat shamed her-- putting her on diet after diet; weighing Ellie once a week; inventorying the food in the house so none could be eaten without Mom knowing; depriving Ellie of activities until she thinned down. I cried and cried for Ellie and for the memory of my fat-shamed days.

Thankfully Ellie's dad accepted her and got her a therapist who helped Ellie speak up in her own defense. Thankfully, also, for a friend Catalina and her family, who were loving and accepting, modeling healthy family interactions.

In the end Ellie doesn't lose weight, she just gains self-acceptance and demands to be treated in a respectful way from everyone. 

In the novel-in-verse format Starfish is an incredibly fast read. I nearly finished it in one sitting. This is a powerful book on a serious topic. It broke my heart but stitched it back together.

5 stars.

Book Beginnings on Friday is hosted by Rose City Reader. First Line Friday is hosted by Reading is My Super Power. Share the opening quote from current book.The Friday56 is hosted at Freda's Voice.  Find a quote from page 56 to share. Visit these two websites to participate. Click on links to read quotes from books other people are reading. It is a great way to make blog friends and to get suggestions for new reading material.

Let's Discuss: Where to post reviews

Where do you post your book reviews?

I post my reviews on my blog. Then I link, if I think to go back and do it, to my Goodreads account where I've already given my very short, initial reaction to the book as soon as I've finished it. I don't really even consider what I say on Goodreads as reviews. I think of my thoughts as 'reactions.' See sample below.

But now I am rethinking this.

Am I doing it backwards? Maybe I should be writing longer reviews on Goodreads and short, pithy reactions to books on my blog. Saving my blog for weekly memes and my personal updates.

Why change?

I get very little traffic on the blog concerning my reviews. No big deal but it does seem like I go through a lot of effort just to basically keep a record of the books I've read and what I thought of them for myself. And if I am interested in what others think of a book, I go to Goodreads and read five six of the reviews there. Unless I am already visiting a blog, like one of yours, and notice that you have reviewed a book I'm interested in, then I will stop and read your review. I'm assuming you do the same thing for reviews on my blog.

I guess I could be asking, why blog review at all? I could be posting reviews on Goodreads and save myself the hassles associated with blog reviews, aka making the review look 'pretty' with graphics, etc. Or maybe, I could continue writing reviews which I publish on my blog and instead of linking that review on Goodreads, I could copy and paste the review from blog to Goodreads.

How do you handle/manage your reviews?

Let's discuss in the comments below.

-Anne

Review: IT'S ALL ABSOLUTELY FINE

With brutal honesty and a sharp wit, London-based illustrator Ruby Elliot sets out to normalize mental health issues and struggles through her often hilarious but mostly poignant illustrated memoir, It's All Absolutely Fine. Published in 2016, it just came to my attention this year when another book blogger reviewed and it and spoke about its relevance and its truthfulness.

A quick Google search landed me on Ruby Elliot's webpage, Rubyetc, where I could revisit her quirky illustrating style. Since I'm not on Instagram, it is a good source to see her illustrating style. I love her description of herself, especially about humor since it is so evident in her book.

Ruby Elliot, also known as Rubyetc, is a cartoonist, illustrator and author who draws about sad things in a funny way and vice versa. She has been published in print (The New York Times, Random House, Orion) online (BBC, Tate Galleries, The New Yorker, Time To Change) and her mum's fridge (The Kitchen). She also runs popular drawing workshops for people of all ages and abilities, in educational settings and beyond. She takes silliness very seriously.

As I read It's All Absolutely Fine, I recollected times as a librarian where only illustrated books could reach students struggling with issues when regular printed material couldn't. Inside Out: Portrait of an Eating Disorder (Shivack) and Blankets (Thompson) are two that I found especially helpful. If I were still a teen librarian I would snatch up It's All Absolutely Fine and place it prominently in my library for those same students, those struggling to make sense of their lives, to find. It is a gem.

Sample page about feelings from It's All Absolutely Fine by Ruby Elliot

I see that Elliot has two newer books, Silly Me and Silly Us, published for the Pound Project in 2021 and '22 and I'm guessing the target of these books is children, based on their size and page count. I will look to see if my public library them.

Now for a quibble with the e-book publisher of It's All Absolutely Fine. It have a Kindle Fire which is several years old and also smallish. The publisher decided to put both sides of the page on one screen shot. There was nothing I could do to read the print and see the illustrations except to enlarge the font which distorted the page and meant I had to manipulate the screen and toggle it around to read everything which was a lot of work and irritating. It was so irritating, as a matter of fact, I nearly abandoned the book altogether. But I did finish the book, through gritted teeth, only because the illustrations and Elliot's disarming humor carried me along.

Publishing issues aside, I recommend this book to anyone who has experienced any kind of mental health issues, eating disorders, disordered thinking, bi-polar disorder, or knows someone who has. I think you will find it helpful and enlightening like I did. And you'll have a laugh while you are reading it.

-Anne

TTT: (Freebie) Pulitzer Prize winners and finalists I "think" I want to read

Top Ten Tuesday: Next Pulitzer Prize Fiction winners I "think" I want to read.

I am almost finished reading my first batch of Pulitzer Prize winners, with only two titles left to go (43 down, over 60 to go.) Now I am turning my attention to other titles I think I want to read. This is not a hard and fast list, just me trying to decide IF I should extend my list to include more books. Any advice from you would be great. Have you read any of these books? What did you think of them? Do you recommend others? My first batch of novels included ALL the winners from the 21st Century. See my list here, if curious what I've already read.

Title / Author	Year winner/finalist	Why
The Orphan Master’s Son by Adam Johnson	2013 winner	This is one of the last two 21st century winners I haven’t read yet.
Train Dreams by Denis Johnson	2012 finalist	In 2012 no winner was announced. Many think this novella deserved it.
The Plague of Doves by Louise Erdrich	2009 finalist	I am a devoted Erdrich fan.
The Known World by Edward Jones	2004 winner	This is one of the last two 21st century winners I haven’t read yet.
American Pastoral by Philip Roth	1998 winner	I’ve read a few books by Roth before and know he is a good writer. Included on Paste Magazine’s top 30 Pulitzer Prize winners list.
Humbolt’s Gift by Saul Bellow	1976 winner	One blogging friend mentioned that she liked this book, though she thought it was a bit plodding. I just want to read something by Saul Bellow and might as well cross off another Pulitzer book while I’m at it. Pretty thin rationale, I realize.
Killer Angels by Michael Shaara	1975 winner	A friend used to rave about all of Shaara’s book (father and son both). It was the first novel on the Shortform list of best Pulitzers that I hadn’t already read, coming in at #30.
House Made of Dawn by N. Scott Momaday	1969 winner	Momaday was the first Native American to win the award.
The Caine Mutiny by Herman Wouk	1952 winner	It made it onto the Shortform’s list, but only at spot #44
All the King’s Men by Robert Penn Warren	1947 winner	This title pretty much shows up on all lists of best Pulitzers.
For Whom the Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway	1942 finalist	“Finalist” wasn’t a thing in 1942. The Pulitzer committee didn’t list the finalists each year until 1980. But no award was given in 1942 due to “politics.” One member of the committee that year vetoed this book.
The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck	1932 re-read winner	I read The Good Earth when I was in junior high school. I loved it. Now I want to reread it as an adult and see if it is as good as I remember it.
The Bridge of San Luis Rey by Thorton Wilder	1928 winner	I’ve placed this book on and off my Pulitzer reading list several times. It made it onto the top 30 Paste Magazine list. Back onto my list it goes.

One additional book I'm adding: Love in Infant Monkeys by Lydia Millet. It was a finalist in 2010, the year that Tinkers won the prize. I hated Tinkers so I decided to read the other finalists that year to see if the committee didn't have much to pick from or what happened.

-Anne

Sunday Salon -- Summer!

Jamie (2) and Ian (5) at Whistler, B.C. (photo credits: R. Adams)

Weather: Blue skies and warm. Yesterday it was overcast in the morning and relatively cool and by evening it was very comfortable being outside. We ate dinner at the picnic table.

Canada: We returned from our Whistler vacation last Sunday. It was a glorious week. As you can see from the collage above of our grandsons, the skies were blue (mostly) and we had many wonderful adventures: a trip up the gondola to the top of the mountain (Blackcomb or Whistler, I'm not sure); a day at the lake playing in the water in our inflatable kayak; a visit to the splash park with the mountains as our back drop; and a hike to the old train wreck site (graffiti). We also played endless games (of Nerts, Wingspan, Ticket to Ride), splashed around in the condos swimming pool, shopped a little, ate a favorite restaurant where we, of course, had sticky toffee pudding. One evening we attended an outdoor concert in the Olympic Plaza to hear the Vancouver Symphony play favorite show tunes by John Williams and other famous pieces from operas. Lovely. It was an almost perfect vacation.

Calf muscle injury: The week would have been perfect had I not injured my calf muscle doing the slightest  activity of stepping off the curb. Sigh. Aging is definitely not for sissies. Luckily it happened later in the week so I wasn't laid up for too long. I'm taking it easy this week as the recommended treatment is rest and ice. You know what that means, don't you? More time to read!

Books (the last three weeks, since my last Sunday Salon post):

• Completed

  

  Completed books: Our Missing Hearts (audio); After; Work Song; It's All Absolutely Fine; Queer Ducks (and Other Animals); Trust (Audio); Starfish; Pray First.

  
  
• Currently reading/listening to:

  

  Current: The Last Thing He Told Me; Frankenstein (print and audio); Victory City (audio); House of Light.

  
  
• What else?
• Super Past Due Review: Grunt
• TTT: Read/White/Blue Book Covers
• Three Book Reviews: Rome -- Antiracism -- Afterlife
• TTT: My Summer Reading List
• Challenge: Give It a Try in July

Shelter Dogs get new homes due to magic. This just makes me so happy.

Have a good week!

-Anne

Super Past Due Review: GRUNT

In January of 2022 I embarked on a personal challenge to correct a deficit in my blogging life -- to write reviews for books I read but never got around to reviewing on paper, or on screen, as it were. Click here if you want to learn more about the challenge to write super past due reviews and to check on my progress.

Back in March of 2017 I read Grunt: The Curious Science of Humans At War by Mary Roach as part of an all-county reads event. Roach was the keynoter at the event's culmination and my book club members and I were all in attendance to hear her speak. Later, when the club met for our proper meeting, we discussed Grunt and what we thought of Roach's presentation. As is often the case, my opinion of the book and the presentation was very different than many of the other women who attended with me. What I found fascinating many found gross.

In Grunt: The Curious Science of Humans at War, Roach takes a look at a whole cadre of topics related to warfare that one might not have thought about before. Taking a look at the contents page I am reminded of many of these odd/interesting/disgusting topics: what kind of material/fabric keeps soldiers warm/cool/fireproof; what really happens when a vehicle drives over bombs and on a related topic, what do we know about genital implants?; the conundrum of military noise; diarrhea as a threat to national security; how to sleep on a submarine; what we they've learn from the dead to keep others alive; and more.

Roach doesn't do her research from books, she does sight visits. She interviews soldiers to talk about what it is like to be in the midst of a battle when you have to go to the toilet. She tries on a pack of tools and implements soldiers have to carry on their backs (and attempts to stand up.) She goes inside the testing facility where the perfect fabric for warfare is being tested. She gets permission to go aboard a submarine and attempts to sleep. Many of the topics she addresses are taboo so she has a hard finding someone she can interview. Many of the topics are gross, diarrhea and penile implantations especially, but Roach approaches her subject with such wonder and enthusiasm it is hard not to feel that way, too. She also has an excellent sense of humor and many of her examples and anecdotes are laugh-out-loud funny. Her presentation at the all-country reads event was full of laughter and good cheer.

I found the whole book fascinating from start to finish and so did my husband, an Army veteran, who could relate to heavy packs and other inconveniences of military service. Some of the ladies in my book club just couldn't get past the frank discussion of diarrhea. I found the information on that topic useful in my nonmilitary life.  

The first book I read by Mary Roach, Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers, is one of the most memorable books I've ever read and I loved it. I totally grossed out my family with it, too, since I insisted on reading quotes out of it when ever I came upon some interesting (read gross) facts about the ways human cadavers are used for medical and safety research. Clearly books about gross stuff don't necessarily bother me.

My husband and I listened to another Roach audiobook: Gulp: Adventures on the Alimentary Canal, which addresses our whole system from mouth to rectum and everything in between. talk about a lot of room for gross stories, but most were weirdly interesting, too. I did review that book, though my review is very short. Both my husband and I have recounted to each other info we gleaned from the book. Something about laughter's ability to help one remember things makes Roach's book fun to read and memorable at the same time.

I have two other Roach titles on my reading list, one I own so I hope to read to it very soon: Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex and Fuzz: When Nature Breaks the Rules. I highly recommend her writing if you enjoy reading nonfiction or just a well-written book on a topic you may know little about.

Grunt-- originally read in 2017, reviewed in 2023!

-Anne

Review: QUEER DUCKS (AND OTHER ANIMALS)

Title: Queer Ducks (And Other Animals): The Natural World of Animal Sexuality by Eliot Schrefer

First Line quote:

Introduction -- The Immorality of Penguins

The Edinburgh Zoo has long been proud of its penguins. In fact, it has Europe's oldest exhibit of them, dating back to 1913. One of their current birds was even knighted! Not that he can hold a sword or anything. How do you determine if a penguin is male or female? Turns out it's not easy. Penguin males and females are the same size, and since their genitalia is tucked away, their sex is only a guess. Only a modern blood test can tell for sure. Those tests weren't around in 1913. Prized animals + hard-to-determine sexes= one big old penguin sex scandal.

Quote from page 56 (actually page 64):

Ch. 4 -- 

Bottlenose Dolphins: Are dolphins just gay sharks? (Or is there true homosexuality in animals?)

There's this old TV show called Glee. Any theater kids reading this have probably already seen it. I watched it for more seasons than I should have, mainly for one character, Brittany, whose big schtick was to spout these deadpan observations that sounded ridiculous but were actually profound. At one point she says, out of nowhere, "Did you know dolphins are actually just gay sharks?" Cut to me, cackling. That was before I'd done the research for this book, before I even knew about the diversity of sex in the animal world.

Summary: Finally a science based research book about animal sexuality! The book is divided into ten chapters each focusing on a different type of same-sex animal behavior in the animal kingdom -- bugs, fish, birds, fowl, wild mammals, domesticated animals. The opening chapter is about doodlebugs, which was the first animal noted by scientists, in the 1800s, to exhibit male homosexual behavior, though the scientists were unsure how to report their findings. Other chapters focus on intersex deer (Velvet Horns) and polyamorous geese, bisexual dolphins and bonobos, sex-changing wrasse fish, and asexual albatross. Schrefer, whose writing is approachable and often humorous, gives analog research-based examples to human sexual orientation and gender identity. Charming comics-style illustrations by Jules Zuckerberg open every chapter, serving aa a little amusing setup before Schrefer dives into the hard science. Interspersed throughout the book are personal anecdotes from Schrefer that reveal how science saved him when he was a young queer person. It is a perfect book for it's YA (Grades 10-12) audience, who would be unlikely to want to consume such information in a textbook-type presentation.

Review: Every June I attempt to read and review at least one LGBTQ+ book during Pride month. This year with all the terrible laws being passed which allow for the discrimination of Trans individuals and other queer folks, it seemed more important than ever to highlight a good book which should be widely read. And I found a great one: Queer Ducks (And Other Animals): The Natural World of Animal Sexuality by Eliot Schrefer. The book came with me on our family vacation to Canada last week and I read one or two chapters each night. In the morning I would report back to my daughter and family what interesting and odd animal sexual behavior Schrefer had highlighted in those chapters. I found it fascinating, so did the family. When I started to read the quote to my daughter, a devoted Glee fan, about dolphins being, she finished the sentence, "gay sharks." Of course dolphins are not gay sharks but they sure are very busy sexually. "When dolphin males get going...they have sexual contact an average of 2.38 times per hour...and the majority of that is with other males" (65).

In the conclusion Schrefer cautions against using animals to argue about human morality. For years humans have called homosexuality "unnatural" citing examples from the animal kingdom that wasn't backed up with any research, or published research. "While the 'why' of animal queerness is still a topic of productive and exciting scientific debate, the 'that' of it -- the fact that animal queerness exists and is substantially represented in the natural world -- is unmistakable...It's not the natural order that declares humans as heterosexual until proven otherwise. That's all a product of human culture, something made up as our ancestors went along" (175).

I can't even begin to tell you how important this book is. Every high school library and public library that services teens should have several copies of it. I recognize that I am a person who is evolving in my understanding about the fluidity of sexuality. This book helped clear away so many cobwebs that were clouding my vision on the topic. All misconceptions are gone now. It feels like a light was switched on in my brain and I can finally see what others have known for years -- we are all on a sexual spectrum and our spot may not be static. And that is just fine.

Highly recommend. Now you read it and recommend it to others, too!  5+ stars.

Book Beginnings on Friday is hosted by Rose City Reader. First Line Friday is hosted by Reading is My Super Power. Share the opening quote from current book.The Friday56 is hosted at Freda's Voice.  Find a quote from page 56 to share. Visit these two websites to participate. Click on links to read quotes from books other people are reading. It is a great way to make blog friends and to get suggestions for new reading material.

-Anne

Review: TRUST

This past week my husband, daughter, and I listened to the co-Pulitzer Prize fiction winner for 2023, Trust by Hernan Diaz. In a nutshell it is the same story, or parallel stories, told from four perspectives. Spoiler alert: Disclosure of more plot details than most reviews is necessary to differentiate the four versions.

Trust opens with the text of Bonds, a (fictional) novel written by Harold Vanner, about a wealthy recluse, Benjamin Rask, who makes a killing in the 1920s stock market and is viewed as an investing savant. Rask's wife, Helen, is also a bit of a recluse and she eventually dies of a mental health treatment. Rask is devastated but will go on.

The second section of Trust is the outline of an unfinished and highly self-aggrandized autobiography of Andrew Bevel, a New York financier and widower, whose life parallels the story of Harold Rask in Bonds. We learn in the third iteration that Bevel wanted to write his autobiography to set the story straight about details of his late wife Mildred's life. Bevel hires Ida Partenza to assist/write his autobiography but doesn't allow her to do any independent research, particularly when it comes to the details of Mildred's life and her passions. When Ida manages to dig up a few details, Bevel says she cannot use that material in the book, preferring to represent Mildred in the most sweet, quiet, and demure ways. The autobiography remains unfinished because Bevel dies before its completion. Years later when Ida is asked to write a new piece on the famous Bevel couple, she finds a diary which tells a fourth, completely different account in Mildred's own words.

Who is the reader to trust? Are all the stories partially true so one needs all four to piece together the information? These questions got me thinking about the definitions of the word 'trust.' Here is what I found in Merriman-Webster:

Reading through all these definitions of the word TRUST, I feel certain that Hernan Diaz did the same thing as he was creating his masterpiece. How many different riffs on the word 'Trust' could he place in one book? Maybe he challenged himself to include them all. Certainly each narrator, even the fictional novelist Vanner, asks the reader to believe their version of the story. Though a novel, everyone in New York knew that Bonds was really about the Bevels, so believed what they read even though it was presented as fiction. Because of this Bevel hired Ida Partenza to write his story and the story of his late wife. He relied on Ida to keep his confidences. In his version of the story Bevel admitted he had to entrust the care of his wife to professionals at a Swiss Sanitorium. You get the idea. Only when we, the readers, hear from Mildred through her diary, do we realize our trust has been misplaced. Very clever!

Whenever a book wins a Pulitzer Prize I always want to know why the committee chose this book over that book, or in this year's case why co-winners were chosen. The Pulitzer Committee said about Trust --

A riveting novel set in a bygone America that explores family, wealth and ambition through linked narratives rendered in different literary styles, a complex examination of love and power in a country where capitalism is king. From Pulitzer.org’s 2023 winners page

And for comparison, the same committee said about Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver, the other 2023 co-winner --

A masterful recasting of “David Copperfield,” narrated by an Appalachian boy whose wise, unwavering voice relates his encounters with poverty, addiction, institutional failures and moral collapse–and his efforts to conquer them. From Pulitzer.org’s 2023 winners page

(My husband just stopped by and read through my review. When he got to this point about the two Pulitzer winners he remarked, "One book is about capitalism in America and the other is about what capitalism causes, poverty.") I guess the selection committee couldn't make up their mind which was the more American story.

 

As I said earlier, we listened to the audiobook of Trust narrated by Edoardo Ballerini, Jonathan Davis, Mozhan Marno, and Orlagh Cassidy. All did a remarkable job narrating their role and thankfully none of them used that irritating speaking quality of dropping their voice, making it hard to hear over road noise. All three of us liked the book but felt a bit challenged by the form. Was our confusion caused by only hearing the text not seeing it on the printed page? If you are considering reading Trust, remind yourself that all four parts are not equal in terms of readability (listenability) but all build on the earlier section. Parts one and two are necessary to appreciate parts three and four.

Trust is 416 pages long, qualifying it for the Big Book Summer Challenge.

-Anne