On Persistence

How do you know when to give up?

I admit to putting a lot of books “aside,” which often means that I’m not up for reading them at a particular moment in time. Usually this has to do with difficult subject matter that requires fortitude and attention. Take, for instance, this stack of hard things that continues to wait for me on my night stand. I will read all of these books…tomorrow.

But giving up? I don’t usually do that. Librarian Nancy Pearl has a guideline for quitting. She calls it her “Rule of 50.” If you’re 50 or younger, give a book 50 pages before letting it go. If you’re older than 50, subtract your age from 100, and use that number as a stopping point. Her reasoning is that life is short, and books are many.

I see that as a good rule for airplane reads, whose purpose is to distract you from the crappiness of travel. But I don’t think that “quality” always reveals itself to me right away. What if the “takeaway” I’d get from something is not just pleasure? What if it’s a new lens or a new idea or greater understanding?

Unfortunately, that logic made me feel like I had to struggle for 10 days through Reservoir 13 by John McGregor. This book was on the Booker Prize Long List, and it supposedly had to do with the disappearance of a girl in a small town. It sounded like a literary mystery – one of my favorite genres. But it isn't. This is a novel about the rhythms of everyday life (grass grows, sheep are born, vegetables are planted, violence happens and then ends…). The artistry, I suppose, lies in the way the author plays subtly with the idea of suspense. Are we, as readers, supposed to have hope?

And I clung to hope! I did! I waited for the exciting, spine-tingling arc! I waited for the “twist!” But as days led to more days (both in the novel and in my own), I came to realize that I was expecting a different kind of book than I held in my hands. I wanted a book where the truth became clear, where wrongs were righted.

I suppose I’m not just talking about a bookish issue. When do we stop hoping for the best in the real world? When do we throw in the towel? And what distinguishes the moments where we do the opposite, where we decide to plug away, put on our raincoats, pick up our signs, and persist?

Photo credit: http://komonews.com/

Review of The Past by Tessa Hadley

On the good news front, I enthusiastically read and finished The Past by Tessa Hadley. It has been quite a while since I was able to get into a zone while reading. And oddly, I think that in any other year I would have complained that this book did not have enough plot to carry it along. But somehow this story of a British extended family gathering at their crumbling summer home hit the spot for me at a time when no other book has been able to satisfy me.

I do like books where siblings or old friends reunite after a time away, and I also like books about secrets (as long as the secrets aren’t too terrible). In this story, four adult siblings, a few children, and a couple of “outsiders” converge at the old family summer estate to decide whether to sell it. While there, they find that they are forever impacted by their past and yet transitioning beyond it. And beneath this family’s story, there is a larger commentary on the way that Britain itself is changing (via immigration, urbanization, etc.).

This is what I pictured. It was featured in an article about dirt-cheap "doer-uppers" in Britain.

I really enjoyed these characters, and I enjoyed the author’s easy prose. Mostly, I appreciated being able to sink into another world after so many weeks of ennui. It didn’t hurt that I had a nice, long weekend away from the tension and traffic of my everyday life. This was the view from my vacation deck, where I spent several hours with my book and a gin and tonic:

For the first time in a long while, I feel optimistic about my reading life.

Review of In Bitter Chill By Sarah Ward

No, I have not fallen down the chimney. I have just been deeply sidetracked by non-bookish things. End of quarter grading, holiday shopping, egg nog…

I just finished In Bitter Chill by Sarah Ward. It’s a debut police procedural that has all the elements of the genre that I love – a brooding-but-kind lead detective, a scrappy young new detective, and a glimmer of flirtation between them. It was ALMOST a perfect escape.

The premise is that two girls were kidnapped in 1978, but only one returned – with no memory of what happened to her or to her friend. Now, decades later, two mysterious deaths bring the old case to the surface, unearthing (ahem) family secrets.

What I love about this book is that it is a genuine crime novel – not a story about a missing teapot or a lost dog. But it is not filled with the intense violence that marks so many mystery/thrillers these days. I was able to get the heart-pounding kick of a good mystery without having to go to therapy afterward.

But I have to say that the ending of this book is terrible, and there is really nothing more annoying than investing  good reading time in a book that ultimately lets me down. I’ll probably read this author’s next book, but I’ll be hoping for a more plausible wrap-up. 

My thoughts about my 2015 reading year will be coming soon!

Review of A God In Ruins by Kate Atkinson

Before I get started, I want to throw out another reminder that The Leaning Stack of Books is having a birthday! I’m giving one lucky reader a copy of the book I’ve enjoyed the most over the past year. What do you have to do to participate? Just let me know the title of your favorite book from the last twelve months. Easy! On Tuesday, October 20, I’ll let everyone know who’s going to get a fun package in the mail.

And now onto other news! I finally – FINALLY-- finished Kate Atkinson’s A God In Ruins. It took me longer to read this one than it did to read Purity, and that’s saying something. But here’s the thing that will surprise you if you’ve stayed with me as I’ve whined about this book – I really liked it. Or, more accurately, I really liked it once I got to the ending.

This book is billed as a “companion piece” to 2013’s Life After Life, which is a novel that follows one character, Ursula, through several versions of her life. The reader gets to see how small choices alter and shape families and communities and world events. Atkinson received a lot of positive press for shaking up Life After Life’s structure in an interesting way.  And once I adjusted to the rhythm of that unusual story, I was captivated.

A God In Ruins follows Ursula’s younger brother, Teddy, but the structure is different. The reader doesn’t follow different iterations of Teddy’s life but instead gets to jump back and forth in time with him. We see him as a young man, when he is a pilot in World War II. We see him as a small child. We see him as a father, as a grandfather, and as a very old man.  What emerges is a rather ordinary portrait of a nice guy.  Often, life gives him lemons. Sometimes he makes lemonade, and sometimes he doesn’t.

The back-and-forth-in-time narration seems to dull some of the suspense that might occur in a story with a clear beginning, middle, and end.  There are many war scenes, and those should be exciting. But Atkinson often writes some elegant version of this kind of sentence in the middle of a chapter:

Teddy would reflect back on this very exciting and scary life-and-death moment from his rocking chair in old age.

The result is that the reader feels reassured that everything is going to work out, though it certainly makes for a less intense reading experience.

So far this sounds like a critique, right? But here’s the thing: this is a novel that is more than it seems. For hundreds of pages, I wondered how this meandering look at a regular guy could possibly be a companion to Life After Life. But because I enjoy Atkinson so much, I should have trusted her. It IS a companion. So if you’re feeling puzzled while reading this book, stop scratching your head. Just hang on, and trust her. TRUST. Just be sure to make it to the very end.

I don’t have much of a memory for the details of Life After Life, and that didn’t impact my experience with this book at all. Other reviewers have mentioned all the crossover characters, but I wasn’t aware of many of them. So, from my perspective, you can read A God In Ruins as a stand-alone piece if you want. What you’ll lose, however, is the connection between the two, and that, I think, is where the magic lies.

An aside: Atkinson writes an author’s note at the end where she tries to justify her choices in this book. I wondered why she felt the need to give so much explanation. However, she also gives a lens into all the research she did about World War II bombing raids. The war scenes are meticulously detailed, and it was interesting to learn about how she constructed them.

Review of Elizabeth Is Missing by Emma Healey

Emma Healey won the 2014 Costa First Novel prize for Elizabeth Is Missing and was on assorted “best of” lists last December. The book follows Maud, an elderly woman with dementia. She is trying to figure out what happened to her friend, Elizabeth, who has seemingly vanished.  But the catch is that she can’t remember anything – where she is, where she’s going, what question she has, whether Elizabeth is actually missing. In fact, Maud only knows that Elizabeth is missing when she finds a note to herself in her pocket.

What Maud does remember is the disappearance of her older sister in the 1940s. While her experience of the current day is chopped up into fragments, the reader gets a more vivid picture of the past.

This book was promoted as a “page turning novel of suspense.” I imagined it would be like Before I Go To Sleep by S.J. Watson. In that book, a woman forgets everything from the previous day, but the reader gets the sneaking suspicion that something sinister is going on. I thought that book was a fun, candy bar of a psychological thriller. 

But somewhat early on, it becomes clear that Elizabeth Is Missing has been improperly billed. This is not a thriller, or even a mystery exactly. This is a story about what it’s like to lose your memory, to have no way to communicate your concerns or organize your questions or be taken seriously. It is also a novel about the way that memory gives meaning and continuity to family.

This is not a perfect book, but one masterful element is Healey’s portrayal of Helen, who is Maud’s adult daughter. Maud is the sole narrator of this story. Without shifting perspectives, Healey tells us what it’s like to be Maud’s main caregiver through small details. We get to see Helen's worry lines, witness her apologies to passersby, hear her sighs of exasperation. Maud might not fully understand her daughter's gestures, but the reader does.

My own mother has long remarked that there are few rich literary portrayals of older characters. I found Maud to be deeply compelling, but I don’t think a character like this would satisfy my mother’s interest. The fact that Maud is so deeply vulnerable (and resembles in uncomfortable ways a character from her past that is described as a “mad woman”) could potentially reaffirm stereotypes of elderly people.  If you have good examples of strong older characters – particularly older female characters – please leave a comment! Here's a Huffington Post column with some suggestions.

(There is, apparently, a new “genre” of fiction called “Matron literature.”  I’m not sure if this is a good thing. I’m wondering if there will be a special table at the bookstore that features “Hot New Titles For Matrons!”)