The Wartime Book Club by Kate Thompson

This book was my neigbor Denise's pick for our Monterey Book Club, and she raved about it. It's kind of a pulpy, low level kind of read, so I was disappointed. I respect Denise a LOT, so I'm surprised she liked this one so much. Maybe she hasn't read the good stuff about the Occupation? Like the Potato Peel Society one? It's miles better!!! but that's why book clubs thrive, I guess. We each decide what's good or not. I just have to find a way to politely voice my disappointment...or not...when we meet.

What is impressive, though, is the whole back section where the author cites her sources and describes some of the historical ties to her characters. They were mostly based on real people and real suffering. That is impressive, but it got so old to have her fictional characters be so trite and predictable...frustrating, really. And it got very old to read about the hardships and the starvation... with very little about how people actually survived emotionally. I'm sure it was through more than just the library books. Yes, it's an ode to help that a book or good story can provide as a get-away, but I'm sure they needed more than that. These people are heroes, and they certainly deserve better portrayal, more nuanced and real portrayal than this author gave them. Sheesh. 

The Unselected Journals of Emma M. Lion, Volume 4, by Beth Brower

 Oh, my goodness, these just get better and better. Volume 4 hits high and it hits deep...Emma goes to Maxwell's burial and is ripped open by grief. The way Pierce comforts her is beautiful. The alchemy between the four main characters is discovered and deepens...Young Hawkes, Emma, Islington, and Pierce. Who doesn't want to be "one of the guys" in a very feminine and protected way? Browers portrays this emerging partnership beautifully. You really want to inhabit this world. So sweet...and yet her grief over Maxwell's loss is so poignant. Maybe this is a great example of knowing the bitter so you can learn to prize the sweet???

That would be an appropriate message as I am studying Moses right now, and the contrast between bitter and sweet and between learning to prize the good comes up a LOT. 

I'm on the waiting list for the next two volumes...I've also put holds on the audio. I think I would enjoy listening to some of these volumes again and again...

The Queen of Water by Laura Resau and Maria Virginia Farinango

 This was an interesting read. I'm not sure who chose it for our Marcia Oshita book club, but I was happy I found it at our library. I'm glad I didn't have to purchase it, because it's not worth giving away or keeping, but it taught me a few things about the indiginous people of Ecuador. 

Virginia is given away as a child and we spend many chapters living through the horrible abuse her new family piles on her. It's hard to read and makes up most of the book. However, she does a good job of describing the conflicting feelings of a young girl, and later of an adolescent.

This girl is caught between cultures and languages and customs. She shows amazing resilience and ingenuity despite horrific obstacles and living conditions. It's inspiring in that way, and it's also a little hard to believe. I liked that she studied so hard and that she ultimately found a way to honor her culture and her adopted culture. I kept thinking about the Lakota and Henry and when or if Henry will grapple with any of these issues. 

It was a good read, but not a great read. I like how it shares the message of how education is the passport out of poverty and hopelessness. But for the average girl in Virginia's circumstances, most would never fought as she fought her way out, I wouldn't think. 

The Unselected Journals of Emma M. Lion, Volume 3 by Beth Brower

 Oh my gosh, this series is getting better and better! And finally, a book with a little more length and heft! Over 200 pages! Woohoo! Pure delight on every page. The humor is pervasive and then suddenly, the pain and grief can appear. It's not all lightness; there is the dark to deal with as well.

In this story, Emma and Niall Pierce get closer. Their attic-note-exchanges become more intimate, and in a very poignant part, he shows her his war photos of Afghanistan. Emma's lightness turns dark, but she is honest and allows herself to be guided through it. The mystery of Pierce deepens and we are still wondering how he got his limp.

Before this seriousness, though, there is the zany episode of looking for clues to obtain tickets to Julius Caesar in St. Crispian's. As Emma and her uncle are teaming up to get these tickets, Archibald meets Tybalt the cat in an unfortunate accident and ends up bed-ridden with a broken leg. His behavior worsens and Emma's reactions are predictably funny. 

I was so happy that his volume got to me through the library before I had to return Volume 4, which came in first. And I want to read them in order. They are so good, though, I may have to purchase the entire series because they are that good. In fact, I could start this one over right now, and I might, after I read Volume 4. It's annoying because they are in such demand, they can't be renewed! I don't want to incur the 10cent a day fine, but it's not that. I don't think it's fair to hold on to them too long, to deprive other anxious readers from carrying on.

One of my favorite characters is Emmas's aunt Eugenia and her insults! Roland and the twins are delightful too. Oh, and the Duke! All of these potential suitors are hilarious, not to mention the young Hawkes and her unintended intended, Charles Goodard. Too funny! Agnes the maid is emerging more too, and all of them make up a colorful tableau. None of these hold a candle, though, to Niall Pierce. I love the way he inhabits a sofa or a room...there must be amazing charisma there. So fun! 

A Train to Potevka by Mike Ramsdell

 I went to some effort to get this book, published in 2006, and finally was able to borrow a copy from Karen, one of my friends in the Ridgeview Ward book club. I think we're calling ourselves the Dixie Book Club now, and I was committed to getting it and contributing to our next discussion because I really enjoy these women, and I've had to miss the last two meetings. 

Mike Ramsdell is a Bear River, Idaho native who wrote about his life and one of his very challenging adventures as a Russian spy. He claims it's fiction because there are laws about what ex-spies can share, but it feels authentic. Along the way we learn about his life growing up, his son Chris, and what it was like to be trained as a spy, to catch your best friend being a traitor, to starving on a train and then in a safe house in Siberia, and to finally reunite with your best friend in Germany and marry her. It held my interest all along the way.

I read for several hours at the Honda Service Center as our Honda had a fuel pump module recall repaired. The two hours flew by. In a lot of ways, it's a simple book, because he doesn't go into great detail about the espionage he's writing about. He outlines Russian history, and describes the Russian landscape and people very descriptively. It's also a fairly fast read and moves along at a good clip. The overwhelming poverty, starvation, alcoholism and constant cold are pervasive in the USSR and the hard life these people live is instructive. I knew a lot of this from my years in West Berlin, sometimes experiencing the Soviet way in East Berlin. The endless concrete block buildings, the pervasive grey of everything, the harshness of the soldiers, the high distrust of everyone because the KGB was everywhere. 

A charming aspect of this book was the author's illustrations. They are simple pen and ink drawings, but add a nice dimension to the book. Ramsdell is LDS but he's not a preacher in this book. He describes his own mission briefly, and his religion comes up when he attempts to buy two Elders dinner in Moscow, but there's no doctrine or Christian message beyond his love and longing for his family. 

After the fall of the Iron Curtain, Ramsdell is in Moscow and describes in great detail how difficult it was to find a restaurant that would serve him and two Elders he encountered at Gorky Park. They end up at the newly-completed McDonalds, but the line snakes outside and is over 2000 people long! It was fascinating to read about little boys who saved places in line, identified foreigners they could help, and then sold increasingly close places in line to the entrance of the restaurant. Capitalism beginning to grow in these young entrepreneurs! And then the disheartening revelation that most of their earnings would be collected nightly by the Russian Mafia.

I knew about the KGB, but was pretty clueless about the Russian Mafia. Both groups seem sinister and destructive to a struggling new government...Russian history is so fascinating and mysterious to me! This book added to the mystery and to my wondering...Is Russia forever destined to be run by corrupt people and is dishonesty still so pervasive? They, as a people, do seem markedly different than their western European neighbors...

Austen at Sea by Natalie Jenner

 I happened to pass this book when I was browsing at the Washington County Library downtown and recognized the author as someone who had written several Jane Austen spin off books that I enjoyed. I figured this one was worth a try.

At first, I couldn't get into it. It was bland, blah, and not even remotely witty. But the plot began to grow on me, and I persisted. It wasn't worth it. It was actually kind of puzzling the way the story unfolded and perhaps is rife with suffrage history, but I'm not sure if it's accurate or fictionalized. At any rate, the raving women intent on women's rights quickly marry and give up other rights. 

The circumstance that kept me reading was the fight over a Jane Austen letter that was given to one of the main characters after she had married. When her husband insisted she sell it, she bolted. This created a legal battle between London and Boston that had several interesting implications. Did she lose her American citizenship by marrying a Brit? This was just one of the thorny issues...

In the ship travel crossing back and forth across the Atlantic, we meet Louisa May Alcott and get to know other characters that were somewhat interesting. All in all, though the characters are likable and the extensive references to Jane Austen's work and life are occasionally insightful, this book is not worth the time. I'm kind of mad I didn't follow my earlier inclination to give it a miss in the first few pages. Oh, well, you never know if a book is going to come alive...This one didn't. 

The Unselected Journals of Emma M. Lion, Volume 2, by Beth Brower

Oh my gosh, I love this Emma M. Lion, and smirk and smile and occasionally laugh out loud at her writing and her situations. I'm still frustrated that each book is so short and that there is such a long wait for each one at the library, but I love them so much I'm sticking with them. I heard somewhere that additional volumes are coming out beyond the seven that are out now, so I wonder if I should go ahead and just purchase the first group? THEY ARE THAT GOOD!

It's so refreshing to have comical and interesting characters and then to throw in some royalty and snobbery and some greed... Really, each page is delightful. In this volume, Emma begins her job as a foil to her cousin Arabella and attends all sorts of interesting social events. She gets to know her Tenant next door, and there is obviously some chemistry brewing. Then her childhood nemesis, Roland, also creates some love tension...and there is a duke in the neighborhood who stops in and is totally entertained by the unusual and unexpected antics of Emma. 

In this volume, Emma and her friend Mary's boyfriend, Jack, conspire to return to her boarding school to retrieve a three-volume set of Jane Eyre, spurred on by a meeting of "the Janes" in her Lapis Lazuli house. The Tenant asks to rent the salon for his studio, so that will probably heat up the action in the next volume. So fun! Such a relief to read funny, witty, and clean and clever fiction!!!