Book Review: The Mockingbird Next Door: Life with Harper Lee by Marja Mills

The Mockingbird Next Door: Life with Harper Lee. Marja Mills. Penguin Press (2014). 278 pages. Genre: Non-fiction, Memoir, Biography.

First Line of the Prologue: "In the summer of 2005, I was having coffee at Burger King with Harper Lee."

Summary: Journalist Marja Mills was given an assignment to visit Monroeville, Alabama, hometown of Harper Lee.  Mills worked for the Chicago Tribune.  The Chicago Public Library had recently launched a program called One Book, One Chicago and they had chosen To Kill a Mockingbird as the first book.  The idea was to get people from all parts of Chicago reading and discussing the same book.  The Chicago Tribune wanted to run a story on the famous author of To Kill a Mockingbird. 

Harper Lee had said very little on record since the publishing of the book.  It was expected that she would refuse an interview.  So, Marja Mills headed to Monroeville with the goal of gaining as much information as she could about the author's life from other sources.  Before leaving town to return to Chicago, she and her photographer stopped by the home that Harper shared with her sister Alice.  Mills wanted to be able to tell her boss that she attempted to contact the author.  She was surprised when the door was opened by Alice Lee.  She was even more surprised when she was invited in for a conversation. 

My thoughts: I really enjoyed the author's narrative style.  The book reads like a novel. While the book is very much about Harper Lee and Alice Lee, it is really a memoir about the author's time spent with them.  So it is told from her perspective.  Along the way, the reader learns a lot about Monroeville - both past and present, and the Lee family.  You get to know Alice, Harper and their friends.  I also listened to some of the audiobook read by Amy Lynn Stewart.  She used different voices for the characters which really gave a southern flavor to the story.  

Marja Mills met Alice Lee first and made an impression on her.  It was because of this meeting that Harper Lee was willing to meet with her.  Known to her family and friends as Nelle, Harper Lee was ready to set the record straight.  For years, reporters had been trying to get an interview with her.  From their very first meeting, Nelle made it clear that, "This would not be an interview." "'Just a visit.'"  Because Marja was agreeable to that, their relationship began to grow.  When the article finally came out in the Chicago Tribune, Nelle gave her approval.  

A few months after the article was printed, Marja Mills was struggling with her health.  She has Lupus and was having a flare.  Usually flares passed in a few days, but this one was worse.  She was told by the newspaper that she needed to take a leave of absence.  She decided that would be a good time to go back to Monroeville and visit Alice and Harper.  It was during this time that it was decided that Marja would write a book about their lives.  She eventually rented a house next door to the Lees.  

If you are curious about the life of Harper Lee or just like a good memoir, I highly recommend this book. 

Quotes:

"When she moved to New York, she had little money and lived frugally.  Even after the unexpected success of her book, she still lived frugally when it came to spending on herself."

"Once home, they would get to clucking over each other, Alice telling Nelle to drive carefully and Nelle telling Alice not to work herself to death.  The two women had this in common:  Sisterly admonition aside, they did as they saw fit."

"She lamented the passing of an era she said I was too young to remember, one in which a reporter's first and only job was to get the facts right, not to inject personal opinion."

Book Review: The Summer of the Great-Grandmother by Madeleine L'Engle

The Summer of the Great-Grandmother (The Crosswicks Journal - Book 2). Madeleine L'Engle. Harper & Row (1974). 245 pages. Genre:  Non-fiction, Memoir.

First Line: "This is the summer of the great-grandmother, more her summer than any other summer. This is the summer after her ninetieth birthday, the summer of the swift descent."

Summary:  Madeleine L'Engle tells about the summer she noticed drastic changes in her mother due to senility.  

My thoughts:  The author's mother always spends the summer with her family at Crosswicks, the country home owned by Madeleine and her husband Hugh.  She spends her winters in warmth of Florida.  It has been four summers since the Great-Grandmother earned her title.  She loves being a Great-Grandmother and enjoys spending time with her grandchildren.  However, this summer she is not herself.  She is fearful and hesitant.  She has difficulty carrying on a conversation, let alone enjoying time with her family.  It seems to have happened suddenly, but looking back, Madeleine can see that changes began to happen a couple of years ago after a major surgery.  

The author describes the things she is seeing in her mother as well as her thoughts and feelings about them.  The book is divided into four sections.  The first section, Summer's Beginning, tells what Madeleine is seeing and feeling.  The next two sections, The Mother I Knew and The Mother I Did Not Know, tell about her mother's past.  The final section, The Summer's End, comes back to the present.  When I first read the description of this book, I thought it would be terribly sad.  While there is some sadness, there is also quite a bit of beauty and joy.  The reader is immersed in the family life of the author with all of its ups and downs.  There are long walks, family dinners and weddings.  This is what I love most about The Crosswicks Journals - the immersion into the daily details of the author's life. 

I highly recommend this book and the first book in the Crosswicks Journals - A Circle of Quiet.  You could read this one as a stand alone, but reading the first book will give you a glimpse into the author's years as a newlywed and young mother.  

Quotes:

"The times I have been most fully me are when I have been wholly involved in someone or something else; when I am listening, rather than talking; cooking a special, festive dinner; struggling with a fugue at the piano; putting a baby to bed; writing."

"School was mostly something to be endured; I don't think I learned nearly as much from my formal education as from the books I read instead of doing homework, the daydreams which took me on exciting adventures in which I was intrepid and fearless, and graceful, the stories Mother told me, and the stories I wrote."

"I have her battered Bible, which Mother had rebound for me. It was much read, much marked, and there are stains which came, I think, through private tears.  Perhaps through it she will teach me an alphabet of grace."

"I have occasional binges of reading English murder mysteries or science fiction, not so much as an escape but as a reminder that there is still honor and fidelity in the world, despite murder and crime; and that the sky above me is full of billions of solar systems and island galaxies, and that nobody has yet been able to put the creation of a galaxy into the language of provable fact."

Book Review: For Such A Time As This by Kayleigh McEnany

For Such A Time As This: My Faith Journey Through The White House And Beyond. Kayleigh McEnany. Post Hill Press (2021). 256 pages. Genre: Non-fiction, Memoir.

First Line: "Beams of sunlight poured through the shutters of my bedroom window."

Summary: Kayleigh McEnany gives the reader a glimpse into her time spent as Press Secretary for Former President Donald Trump.  Along the way we learn about the path she took to get there, how this role affected her personal life and how faith carried her through every circumstance. 

My thoughts:  Memoir is my favorite type of non-fiction book.  One of the things I enjoy about memoirs is that they are often full of daily details that might get left out of a biography.  For Such A Time As This was just such a book.

Before reading this book I knew very little about Kayleigh McEnany.  I admire her diligence and her dedication to what is important.  It was fascinating to see the inner workings of the White House.  I gained a deeper understanding for the time, dedication and sacrifice every member of the President's staff must give.  While this is Kayleigh's story, she spent much of the book shining a light on those around her, pointing out how they helped her or sacrificed for others.  

I really appreciated the way Kayleigh shared the struggles she faced in being a wife, mother and White House Press Secretary.  Even though she loved her job and took it very seriously, she often shed tears when leaving her daughter whether for a week or a day.  She was fortunate to have a mother who was willing and able to help her out.  She also highlights the way the President and White House staff emphasized the importance of family and gave her flexibility.  

As a Christian woman, Kayleigh's faith comes through on every page.  In most chapters she shares a situation, either in her work or personal life, where she relied on her faith.  I found this encouraging and refreshing. 

The Acknowledgements pages at the end of the book give further testimony to the type of person Kayleigh is.  I don't think I have ever read a book containing nine pages of Acknowledgements!  Each one was very personal and specific and I am sure let each person know what they meant to her.  

If you enjoy memoirs, especially those of Christian women, or are curious about the inner workings of the White House, I recommend this book.  

Quotes:

"If we all endeavored to recognize loss wherever it occurs, rather than taking sides, we would be far better off."

"I believe God wants everyone to embrace an Esther-like outlook.  You are sitting where you are sitting geographically, professionally, and personally for a reason.  God wants you to fulfill His purpose.  He has great plans and a solemn mission for all of us to further His kingdom."

Book Review: A Circle of Quiet by Madeleine L'Engle

A Circle of Quiet (Crosswicks Journals #1). Madeleine L'Engle. Seabury Press (1971). 246 pages. Genre:  Non-fiction, Memoir.

First Line: "We are four generations under one roof this summer, from infant Charlotte to almost-ninety Great-grandmother."

Summary:  These writings are taken from the author's journals about the early days of her marriage when her children were little.  She and her family lived year round at Crosswicks, a big old New England farmhouse. It is about daily life, the author's struggle to fit in time to write, trying to balance the work of a mother and homemaker with attempting to get a book published, and the people who make up the community.  It includes reflections on motherhood, writing, the state of the world, and God. 

My thoughts:  This was my second attempt at reading this book.  The first time I tried to read it, I just wasn't in the right frame of mind and couldn't get into it.  I decided to give it another try and am so glad I did.  It has become one of my favorites reads of 2021.  

In these pages we meet the author, who is best know for her book A Wrinkle in Time.  We also meet her husband, Hugh Franklin, an actor and their children.  Things are not told in a linear fashion like a story would be, rather we get glimpses into their lives combined with reflections on various things.  Sometimes quotidian details are included, other times lofty thoughts.  

Although this was published in the early 1970's, the actual journals were written in the 1960's.  Many of the things she was concerned about are still concerns today and have become even more prevalent.  I found it really interesting to get inside a mind living during the 1960's and to see what her concerns were, what she thought about.  Of course, I always love all the details of daily life, so journals appeal to me.  

There are three more books in the Crosswicks Journals series and I am eager to read them.

Quotes: 

"'But what about the mystery writers? They don't make any response to the problems of the world in their stories.' And I cried, 'Oh, but they do!' and cited some of my favorite writers, Josephine Tey, John Dickson Carr, Dorothy Sayers - I could go on and on - and said, 'Think about them.  Their mysteries may be nothing but exciting stories on the surface, but there's a definite moral response to the world in every single one of the really good ones."

"The more limited our language is, the more limited we are; the more limited the literature we give to our children, the more limited their capacity to respond, and therefore, in their turn to create.  The more our vocabulary is controlled, the less we will be able to think for ourselves.  We do think in words, and the fewer words we know, the more restricted our thoughts. As our vocabulary expands, so does our power to think.  Try to comprehend an abstract idea without words: we may be able to imagine a turkey dinner.  But try something more complicated; try to ask questions, to look for meaning: without words we don't get very far.  If we limit and distort language, we limit and distort personality."

Book Review: Diary of a Young Naturalist by Dara McAnulty

Diary of a Young Naturalist. Dara McAnulty. Little Toller Books (2020). 224 pages. Genre:  Non-fiction.

First Line:  "In the darkness my dreams are interrupted."

Summary:  Following the seasons, Dara McAnulty chronicles a year in his life.  He is a young man, fourteen years old, who lives with his mum, dad, brother and sister in Northern Ireland.  Dara is also autistic.  His diary tells of his family life, the time he spends in nature, and the way he processes the world.  

My thoughts:  From the beginning, I could tell that Dara was a young man who has read and been read to.  His writing is beautiful and lyrical.  

Dara comes from a family of people with Autism.  His mother, brother and sister are all autistic.  The good news is that because his mother is autistic, she knows exactly what is going on inside the kids.  She is able to prepare them for whatever is coming their way and often does.  I was amazed at the insight Dara has in regards to his mother and how she is feeling and that he even noticed.  They have a wonderful, intentional home life and I loved hearing about it.  

One of the ways the family spends their time is by being outside in nature.  This has created a love for the natural world in Dara.  He says this about himself:

"I have the heart of a naturalist, the head of a would-be scientist, and bones of someone who is already wearied by the apathy and destruction wielded against the natural world."

His connection to the natural world helps him make sense of the world.  He says that he doesn't always understand people, but the natural world always makes sense and gives him a feeling of peace. 

This was a fascinating, well-written book that allowed me to visit Northern Ireland, learn something about how someone with Autism processes the world and gain a deeper appreciation for the natural world.  

Quotes:

"Whether it's bioluminescence or the combustion of methane, it's wonderful to let the mind wander off with banshees and will-o'-the-wisps - folklore and stories are so often inspired by the strange and beautiful in the natural world, and all these stories bring nature, deeply, into our imagination."

"I do love these stories [Celtic Mythology].  They enrich my life as a young naturalist.  Science, yes, always science.  But we need these lost connections, they feed our imagination, bring wild characters to life, and remind us that we're not separate from nature but part of it."

"Noticing nature is the start of it all.  Slowing down to listen, to watch.  Taking the time, despite mountains of homework.  Making a space in time to stop and stare, as the Welsh poet W. H. Davies wrote in 'Leisure':

    What is life if full of care,

    We have no time to stop and stare.

    No time to stand beneath the boughs

    And stare as long as sheep and cows.

    No time to see, when woods we pass,

    Where squirrels hide their nuts in grass.

I don't see it as 'leisure though.  This is good work.  Heart work. Taking the time to observe nature, to immerse oneself in its patterns, structures, happenings and rhythms.  It's how mathematicians and scientists are nurtured."

Book Review: My Own Two Feet by Beverly Cleary

My Own Two Feet: A Memoir. Beverly Cleary. Harper Collins (1995). 352 pages. Genre: Non-fiction; Memoir.

First Line: "The three of us, Mother, Dad, and I, stood on the sidewalk outside the Greyhound bus station in Portland, Oregon, searching for words we could not find or holding back words we could not speak."

Summary:  This is the second installment of Beverly Cleary's autobiography beginning after her high school years in the 1930's.  It covers her time at college in another state, various jobs, dating, marriage and getting her first book published. 

My thoughts: This is an interesting look not only at the author's life, but California and Oregon in the late 1930's and 1940's.  The book opens with Beverly leaving her home in Oregon to travel by Greyhound to California to stay with her aunt and uncle.  Our country was in the midst of the Depression and Beverly was weary of it.  In California, people didn't live like the Depression was so close.  She says, "The Depression had made Oregonians relentlessly practical." When she meets some friends of the family and they go to eat in a restaurant, she is amazed.  No one she knows eats in restaurants.  Her eyes are opened to many things on her trip to California.  It was fascinating to hear what things cost, how women made most of their clothing, and how far they were able to make food stretch.  It was also fascinating to read about the jobs many women had at the time.  Her aunt was a librarian at the college.  Beverly not only attended college, but worked her way through it at a time when that wasn't always easy to do.  Not only because of the work involved, but because many jobs were not given to women because that would be taking a job from a man who needed to support his family.  

Beverly had a difficult relationship with her mother.  She was an only child and her mother wasn't ready to let her go.  She had strong ideas about how Beverly should live her life and who she should or should not marry.  Unfortunately, this caused Beverly to dread going home at times.  

After finishing college, she worked at several interesting jobs.  As a children's librarian, in a bookstore and in a library on an army base.  She had always wanted to write, but was too busy.  Finally after the war, she determined it was time.  

I have always enjoy Beverly Cleary's clear writing style.  I love the way she describes things in detail, remembering the little things that make up day to day life.  I found it interesting that she mentions this advice from one of her professors - "One sentence that he repeated has stayed with me all my life, and I often think of it as I write: 'The proper subject of the novel is universal human experience.'  A phrase that has also stayed with me is 'the minutiae of life,' those details that give reality to fiction."  Those things definitely show up in her novels and in this book as well.  

If you are interested in Beverly Cleary's life or learning more about California and Oregon in the Depression era give this book a try.  I highly recommend it.

Book Review: The Cloister Walk by Kathleen Norris

The Cloister Walk. Kathleen Norris. Riverhead Books (1997). 385 pages. Genre:  Non-fiction, Memoir.

First Lines of Preface:  "Ten years ago, when I became a Benedictine oblate, I knew two things: I didn't feel ready to do it, but I had to act, to take the plunge.  I also had no idea where it would lead."

Summary:  Kathleen Norris, a poet by trade, took steps to become a Benedictine oblate.  This book relates some of her experiences while on that journey along with her reflections on life inside the monastery, the liturgical world of the church, life outside the monastery, what it means to be a writer and all the things that went on in her life during this time period.  It is a memoir, but it is not told in a linear fashion.  Rather, it follows the liturgical year of the church. 

My thoughts:  If the number of quotes copied into my commonplace book is any indication of how much I enjoyed a book, this one would be near the top of the list. And I did enjoy this one.  However, I was a little disappointed that it wasn't a more linear story of her experience.  I found myself with lots of questions I wanted answered.  When I was able to just get over that, I enjoyed the journey.

I have always been fascinated with stories of people who choose to live differently than the majority of those around them.  Kathleen Norris applied to become an oblate after an encounter with Benedictines at a conference.  The St. John's Abbey website explains an oblate like this:

Saint Benedict founded his first monastery about 1,500 years ago. Over time, men and women, friends and neighbors outside the monasteries wanted to be affiliated with the work and prayer of the monks. These individuals were often married, had family obligations, and employment. They lived outside of the monastery but offered themselves to God, dedicating their lives to the guidance of the Rule of Saint Benedict as oblates. The word “oblate" comes from the Latin oblatus, which means someone who is offered up or dedicated to something.

Norris is married and has an outside job. However, she chose to become an oblate and spent two nine-month terms at St. John's Abbey. The framework for her story is the church's liturgical year. Immersing herself in this by living at the Abbey had a deep affect on her. As she tells her story, she also reflects on the liturgy and rituals of the church and Benedictine life. We are introduced to monks and nuns that she associates with as well as those from the past along with lives of the saints. Interwoven into this is the reality of her life with her husband and the difficulty of being apart for many months. We also learn something about her past, the family she grew up in, and the decision she and her husband made to move to her ancestral home in South Dakota.

Something else that made this especially interesting to me is that all of my life I have driven by the location of St. John's Abbey. St. John's Abbey is on the campus of St. John's University near St. Joseph, MN, located just off of busy Interstate 94. My family would pass it on the way to my grandparent's home. Later, my parents lived just north of St. Joseph, MN. The sister school of St. John's is St. Benedict's University. The campuses are separated by the Interstate. As a young person I attended danceline camp at St. Benedict's. Both St. John's and St. Benedict's are used for camps and retreats during the summer. However, I have never been to the Abbey!

This book was beautifully written and fascinating. Something that struck me was that those living the cloistered life as monks and nuns deal with the same struggles, temptations and difficulties that the rest of us do. Somehow I have always thought that removing yourself from "normal" life would also remove some of the difficulties. The difference is that monastics are living among people who have the same beliefs and are trying to life their lives in the same way. I guess in some ways that would make dealing with struggles a bit easier. If you enjoy memoirs or are interested in Benedictine life, you might enjoy this book.

Quotes:

"To eat in a monastery refectory is an exercise in humility; daily, one is reminded to put communal necessity before individual preference. While consumer culture speaks only to preferences, treating even whims as needs to be granted (and the sooner the better), monastics sense that this pandering to delusions of self-importance weakens the true self, and diminishes our ability to distinguish desires from needs. It's a price they're not willing to pay."

"One year at the American Benedictine Academy convention, an abbot, speaking on the subject of 'The Monastic Archetype,' suddenly dropped all pretense to objectivity and said he was troubled by the growing number of cereals made available for breakfast in his community. 'How many kinds of cereals do we need,' he asked, 'in order to meet genuine health needs without falling into thoughtless consumerism?'"

"I find it a blessing that monks still respect the slow way that words work on the human psyche."

"Moments like this are when the congregation is reminded of something that all pastors know; that listening is often the major part of ministry, that people in crisis need to tell their story, from beginning to end, and the best thing - often the only thing - that you can do is to sit there and take it."

"Metaphor is valuable to us precisely because it is not vapid, not a blank word such as 'reality' that has no grounding in the five senses. Metaphor draws on images from the natural world, from our senses, and from the world of human social structures, and yokes them to psychological and spiritual realities in such a way that we are often left gasping: we have no way to fully explain a metaphor's power, it simply is."

"The fact that the translators imagine 'night' to be an adequate substitute for 'darkness' only proves that they have a seriously impoverished understanding of metaphor and the nature of language."

Book Review: My Family and Other Animals by Gerald Durrell

My Family and Other Animals (Corfu #1). Gerald Durrell. Penguin (2004) (Originally published 1956). 273 pages. Genre: Non-fiction, Autobiography, Travel. 

First Lines: "This is the story of a five-year sojourn that I am my family made on the Greek island of Corfu.  It was originally intended to be a mildly nostalgic account of the natural history of the island, but I made a grave mistake by introducing my family into the book in the first few pages."

Summary:  When Gerald Durrell was ten, he and his two older brothers, one older sister and their mother, moved from England to the island of Corfu.  This book chronicles their five years there, the interesting people they met, the beauty of the island and, of course, the animals that Gerry found so intriguing.

My thoughts:  Gerald Durrell's style of writing makes this book easy to read.  He has a way with words that makes you laugh.  

I love his portrayal of his siblings.  His older brother, Larry, tends to over exaggerate most things.  He does most things big.  Whether it is his reaction to something or the number of people he invites to a party, the bigger the better.  Leslie is more down to earth and logical.  He prefers to spend his time with a gun in his hand hunting for prey.  Margo can be overly dramatic.  She prefers to spend her time reading magazines or sunbathing wearing very little clothing. 

Gerald's mother is a saint.  She tolerates with patience each of the quirks of her children and especially a house full of unlikely pets.  I tolerated my children's quirks as well, but having a house full of scorpions, snakes and large birds would have driven me crazy.  While she is tolerant, she is also not afraid to tell it like it is.  When the children are arguing, she tells them that they argue about the stupidest things.  

I loved the descriptions of the island and the beautiful things that grow there.  The animal life and Gerry's interest in them was fascinating as well.  I'll admit there were a few situations that had me squirming though.  

If you like to visit exotic places from your armchair and meet interesting people and animals, I recommend this book.  

Quotes: 

"Upstairs Margo was in a state of semi-nudity, splashing disinfectant over herself in quantities, and Mother spent an exhausting afternoon being forced to examine her at intervals for the symptoms of the diseases which Margo felt sure she was hatching."

"'A dreadful journey!' Mother agreed.  'When we came out of the cinema I thought we were going to get a car, but no, he hustled us into a cab, and a very smelly one at that.  Really, I think he must be mental to try and come all that way in a cab.  Anyway, it took us hours and hours, because the poor horse was tired, and I was sitting there trying to be polite, dying to scratch myself, and longing for a drink.  All the fool could do was sit there grinning at Margo and singing Turkish love songs.  I could have cheerfully hit him.'"

"So Dodo settled in, and almost immediately showed faults in her make-up which caused us more trouble than all the other dogs put together.  To begin with she had a weak hind-leg, and at any time during the day or night her hip joint was liable to come out of its socket, for no apparent reason.  Dodo, who was no stoic, would greet this catastrophe with a series of piercing shrieks that worked up to a crescendo of such quivering intensity that it was unbearable.  Strangely enough, her leg never seemed to worry her when she went out for walks, or gambolled with elephantine enthusiasm after a ball on the veranda.  But invariably in the evening when the family were all sitting quietly, absorbed in writing or reading or knitting, Dodo's leg would suddenly leap out of its socket and she would roll on her back and utter a scream that would make everybody jump and lose control of whatever they were doing."

Book Review: Diggin' Up Bones by Bonnie Wright

Diggin' Up Bones: One Woman's Spiritual Struggle and Her Golden Retriever Who Leads Her Out of Unconscious Transgenerational Shame. Bonnie Wright. SS Safari All-Star Press (2021). 456 pages. Genre: Non-fiction; Memoir.

First Lines: "Living a divided life is a lie.  While I appeared normal to the world, I hid the dark shadow of trauma. It got inside me and followed me."

Summary: Bonnie grew up in a home full of harsh words, anger and criticism.  There was very little affection in her home.  Had it not been for her mother's deep faith, she would never have understood that there was something more than this life.  

As she grew up and left home, she found herself patterning her life after the home life she experienced growing up.  She married a man who turned out to be just like her dad.  How could she have done that?  She never intended to do that and yet, she found herself choosing another similar man.  The warning signs were there, but Bonnie's deep longing to be loved caused her to ignore them.  

She had been blessed with a couple of pets in her life and always found them as loving companions that loved her without condition. So, she decided to adopt a male Golden Retriever.  As Bonnie began training him and helping him through the aggression issues that he had, she began to realize that she had some heart issues that needed to be worked through.  This is the story of Bonnie's journey from a young woman full of shame and longing to a woman who has discovered true love and purpose. 

My thoughts: Bonnie and her dog, Siri, attend my church.  I have often been greeted by them at the front door on a Sunday morning.  Part of Bonnie's story was recently shared in one of our pastor's sermons.  I knew then that I wanted to read her book.

Bonnie's story is incredible in many ways.  She has endured things both as a child and an adult that no human being should ever have to endure.  It was often difficult to read.  But, there were always glimmers of hope.  She is an overcomer and that definitely comes through in the memoir.  She has been knocked down many times, but doesn't stay down for long. 

Her relationship with her dogs is beautiful.  Many people never experience that depth of relationship with a human being, let alone with a dog.  I learned a lot about training a dog and the grueling work required to get a dog ready for competition.  From my own experience I know that dogs can sense a person's feelings, but I learned much about the depth of a dog's feelings.  It reminded me that often the thing a hurting person needs is just someone to be with them.  Dogs can't say a word, but their loving presence often is better than words. 

I recommend this book for anyone who enjoys memoirs, is a dog lover or wants to read about an incredible faith journey.  

Book Review: God's Hotel by Victoria Sweet

God's Hotel: A Doctor, A Hospital, and a Pilgrimage to the Heart of Medicine. Victoria Sweet. Riverhead Books (2012). 372 pages. Genre: Memoir.

First Lines:  "It was my first autopsy, my first day in the clinical clerkship of medical school called pathology.

Of course, I had seen and even taken apart dead bodies before, in the first months of medical school, but those had been bodies that were clearly ex-bodies."

Summary:  When Victoria Sweet first entered medical school she intended to pursue psychiatry.  After two years of medical school a student begins practicing what they have learned on real patients.  She found she loved the process of taking the patient's "history", the actual process of examining the patient and noticing what clues the condition had written on the body and then analyzing the facts and coming to a conclusion which is a diagnosis and plan for treatment.  When she finished medical school she realized that psychiatry "had changed since Jung" and this was a bad thing in her mind.  So, she practiced medicine in a country clinic.  

Ever since that first autopsy in medical school she wondered about the invisible force that made a body alive and when it left made the body dead.  While practicing medicine she continued to research.  It was during this research that she discovered a book about a German nun's medical practice in the Middle Ages.  This is how she began to learn about "premodern medicine".  She discovered that, unlike modern medicine, "The body was not imagined as a machine nor disease as a mechanical breakdown."  This was thrilling and she wanted to learn more. So she began looking for a position that would allow her to practice medicine while also pursuing a doctorate in the history of medicine.  

This led her to Laguna Honda Hospital in San Francisco.  

"Laguna Honda was an almshouse, she explained as we started, or, as the French called it, an Hotel-Dieu - God's Hotel - a kind of hospital from the Middle Ages that evolved as a way of taking care of those who couldn't take care of themselves."

There was a time in our history when every county had an almshouse.  Laguna Honda was the last almshouse in America.  Dr. Sweet was hired as a part-time physician and this book is the story of the years she spent there.

My thoughts:  What a fascinating book!  Victoria Sweet is an amazing storyteller and that made this book hard to put down.  

As she tells the story of her time at Laguna Honda we are introduced to some of the doctors and nurses she works with as well as some of her patients.  As in a great work of fiction, I fell in love with many of them.  

While working at the hospital she is also pursuing a doctorate in medical history and it is interesting to follow her on this journey which eventually takes her to Switzerland for a year.  Along the way she shares with the reader what she is learning. 

Many changes begin to take place at Laguna Honda.  The Department of Justice is sent to do a review.  After months of investigation and pages of reports, the DOJ found Laguna Honda to be inefficient, unsafe and lacking privacy.  Changes would need to be made.  Dr. Sweet thought about these things as she made her rounds.  It may be true that things were inefficient, but sometimes that inefficiency was actually more efficient than the so called efficient methods and often saved more money.

For example, there is the case of Mrs. Muller.  She became Dr. Sweet's patient when she was brought in to Laguna Honda because she just couldn't manage anymore.  Eight months ago she had broken her hip.  She had had surgery to replace the hip and was sent home.  However, after the surgery she became delirious.  Her workup showed no acute medical problems, so her doctors concluded that she had undiagnosed Alzheimer's disease that was causing the psychosis and started her on an antipsychotic medication.  She was also found to have diabetes and put on medication for that.  She remained confused even though she was on the antipsychotic medication and became withdrawn and unable to manage her diabetes.  She complained that her hip hurt.  All of these things are what brought her to Laguna Honda.  

Dr. Sweet always started by meeting with a new patient.  That way she could examine them for herself regardless of what the chart might say.  She expected Mrs. Muller to be withdrawn and confused, but when she greeted her, she got a "Good afternoon" in response.  She knew her name, where she was, the date and what was wrong with her.  An Alzheimer's patient would not necessarily be able to tell her these things.  As she continued the physical examination, she couldn't find any of the subtle signs of diabetes.  On examining her hip, she found very restricted range of motion which is unusual 6 months after surgery.  After taking an x-ray she discovered that Mrs. Muller's new hip was dislocated which is what was causing her pain and lack in range of motion.  She scheduled surgery to put the hip back in place.  After this she seemed better, more relaxed.  Once her hip healed from the surgery, Dr. Sweet discontinued the pain medication.  Mrs. Muller became brighter and stronger.  In a few more weeks, Dr. Sweet wondered if she was really demented or psychotic.  She decided to try taking her off of the antipsychotic medication.  This process takes several weeks of tapering the medication.  Mrs. Muller got brighter and stronger each day.  She asked if she could go to physical therapy and learn to walk again.  After 3 months she was doing quite well and Dr. Sweet revisited her diabetes diagnosis.  She didn't see any physical signs of long-term diabetes and so decided to gradually taper her off of the insulin to see what would happen.  Nothing happened.  She was fine without the insulin.  Mrs. Muller did eventually go home.

Dr. Sweet's point was that at Laguna Honda they had time to do this type of thing.  Also, the doctors weren't specialized and were able to look at all the angles.  The efficiency of the health-care system meant that they wanted to take care of the problem in the quickest way possible.  There was no time to observe and wait.  Also it meant, for example, that the physical therapist only worked on physical therapy and didn't try to figure out why Mrs. Muller's range of motion was limited, the nurses gave her insulin, but didn't question whether she needed it or not.  They didn't work together to make sure the patient was whole, they didn't have time.  So, if she would have come to Laguna Honda first, where they were inefficient and able to just observe a patient for a while, they could have saved so much time, discomfort and money.

Another example of inefficiency was Miss Lester.  She had been the director of nursing for thirty-six years.  She had accepted the position right after she got out of the army.  She ran the hospital with a firm hand and an underlying softness.  But if something needed typed, Miss Lester typed it, she answered the telephone, she made calls and she spoke with patients and family members.  Every morning at 6:30 am she met the nursing supervisor of the night and the nursing supervisor of the morn.  Together they went to see every patient in the hospital, all 1,178 of them.  This took approximately 3 hours every single day.  Miss Lester knew everything about every patient and was able to give orders to each head nurse.  In this way Miss Lester gave her patients the very best care and was able to instruct her nurses in providing what was necessary.  

Dr. Sweet began to refer to this process of observing a patient, sitting with them, trying things as Slow Medicine.  

After she finishes her doctorate in medical history, Dr. Sweet takes a pilgrimage.  She decided on the medieval pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela in Spain.  Because of her work schedule she would need to divide the pilgrimage into four sections and complete them in four years.  The story of each pilgrimage is short and interspersed into whatever was going on at that time in the hospital.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book and highly recommend it.  

Quotes:

"It used to be that all doctors knew Latin.  For centuries, medical books were written in Latin; medical terms were derived from Latin; and, most important, in the days before science, the knowledge of Latin differentiated the physician from the traditional healer."

"Instead it was the Christian monastery of the Middle Ages that originated the hospital system we know today.  In the monastery, caring for the sick was the foremost Christian duty, and each monastery had, therefore, a hospice for taking care of the sick poor and an infirmary for taking care of the sick monks."

"She was expected to die of liver failure, and soon.  Her crime was alcohol.  Now, the liver can tolerate many years of drinking; unlike the brain, heart, or limbs, under the right conditions the liver can regenerate and reconstruct itself."

"There'd been the shutting down of most of the almshouses in the country; then the phasing out of most of the free county hospitals; and, last but not least, the closing of the state mental hospitals.  The closing of the state mental hospitals was particularly disastrous, the result of an unwitting but agreeable collusion of the Left and Right; the Left being convinced that institutionalization of any kind was harmful, and the Right, that institutionalization of any kind was expensive."

"And it made me wonder whether fun, although inefficient, might actually be therapeutic and, therefore, efficient."

"This being Laguna Honda, however, I had the time to wait and see - for family and friends to show up and fill me in on the details; for Mr. Tam to get better or worse or stay the same; for a trial of medications to treat his possible depression, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's.  In short, for Slow Medicine to do its job."

Book Review: The Prize Winner of Defiance, Ohio by Terry Ryan

The Prize Winner of Defiance, Ohio: How My Mother Raised 10 Kids on 25 Words or Less. Terry Ryan. Simon & Schuster (2001). 351 pages. Genre:  Biography.

First Lines:  "The ordinarily sleepy town of Defiance, Ohio, emitted an industrious hum on hot days, a subtle pulse of activity - like the buzzing of distant bees.  It was late Indian summer, a little too warm for an October day, in 1953."

Summary:  Evelyn Ryan was the mother of 10 children.  Money was tight so she began using her love of language to enter jingle contests.  At that time almost every brand had a jingle and in order to keep them fresh, they would hold contests requiring entrants to provide a line or two of a jingle.  The winners would receive prizes.  Sometimes the prizes were small.  But other times there were several prizes awarded to one winner.  

Evelyn was constantly working on jingles for whatever the current contest was.  She kept a notebook nearby as she worked around the house.  She loved to iron because that is where she could do her best thinking.  She would keep her notebook on the end of the ironing board to jot down her ideas.  She won many prizes, from a couple of dollars to cars, appliances and thousands of dollars.  She kept the smaller prizes in her closet and would use them as needed to replace items around the house or as gifts.  

My thoughts:  The book is written by one of the daughters of Evelyn Ryan and so is told from her perspective.  Evelyn was a woman who never gave up.  She would enter many contests and not win anything, but she never let that dampen her spirit.  Mr. Ryan worked in a machine shop where he made, "...$90 a week, barely enough to pay for food and rent."  Unfortunately, he was also an alcoholic and spent too much on his nightly consumption of liquor.  Evelyn didn't let this defeat her either.  She just continued to take care of her family and do the best she could to make ends meet.

Most interesting to me was the peek into life in the 1950's in Ohio.  

"In the days before credit cards, few people in Defiance had a checking account.  Bills were paid in cash and in person."

"She was always trying to replace the dilapidated family Chevy with something a bit more dependable.  Just to start the car most mornings required a ten-person push so Dad could pop the clutch and rumble off to work in a cloud of blue smoke."

"Back in Defiance, the rest of the Ryan family, gathered around the TV to watch Bruce on national television, saw nothing of the show.  The blizzard ruined the reception, and 'snow' was all we were able to pick up.  We sat inches in front of the TV for the entire hour anyway, unable to hear or see a thing."

I felt sad for the family as they lived with alcoholism.  Mr. Ryan missed out on so much.  But I was encouraged by Evelyn's resilience and ability to keep going even when everything seemed to be against her.  

I would recommend this book if you enjoy memoirs, history of America in the 1950's or stories about overcoming obstacles.  

Book Review: 84, Charing Cross Road by Helene Hanff

84, Charing Cross Road

Author:  Helene Hanff

Publisher:  Penguin (1970)

97 pages

Genre:  Non-fiction, Memoir

84, Charing Cross Road is a book written in letters that were sent between Helene Hanff and Marks & Co., an antiquarian bookseller in London.  Miss Hanff has an "antiquarian taste" in books and has difficulty finding the books she wants in New York at a reasonable price. She sees an ad for Marks & Co. in the Saturday Review of Literature and decides to write and ask if they could supply her with any of the books on her list.  

She receives a letter in return letting her know that some of the books on her list are on their way to her.  The letter is signed FPD.  So begins a relationship between Miss Hanff and Marks & Co., Booksellers.  Most of the correspondence is written by FPD, Frank Doel, on behalf of Marks & Co.  However, after Miss Hanff sends gifts to the shop, some of the other employees secretly write to her sending their thanks.  The correspondence begins in 1949 and continues through 1969.  

My thoughts:  This book has been on my TBR list for a long time.  I am so glad I finally got around to reading it!  It was an enjoyable read that left me wanting to know more about the people writing the letters.  We are given a glimpse into the personalities and lifestyles of the writers, as well as little pieces of history that affect their lives.  Miss Hanff likes to send gifts to the shop for them all to share.  She thoughtfully chooses things that might be difficult to find in London at the time such as meat and eggs.  

The book talk is fascinating as well.  Miss Hanff loves old English books and especially secondhand copies.

"I do love secondhand books that open to the page some previous owner read oftenest."

Her reading preferences:

"Wasn't anything else that intrigued me much, it's just stories, I don't like stories.  Now if Geoffrey had kept a diary and told me what it was like to be a little clerk in the palace of richard III - THAT I'd learn Olde English for."

"You'll be fascinated to learn (from me that hates novels) that I finally got round to Jane Austen and went out of my mind over Pride & Prejudice which I can't bring myself to take back to the library till you find me a copy of my own."

And this was my favorite bit about housecleaning her books:

"I houseclean my books every spring and throw out those I'm never going to read again like I throw out clothes I am never going to wear again.  It shocks everybody.  My friends are peculiar about books.  They read all the best sellers, they get through them as fast as possible, I think they skip a lot.  And they NEVER read anything a second time so they don't remember a word of it a year later.  But they are profoundly shocked to see me drop a book in the wastebasket or give it away.  The way they look at it, you buy a book, you read it, you put it on the shelf, you never open it again for the rest of your life but YOU DON'T THROW IT OUT!"

I'm not sure that I could bring myself to throw out a book either, but I will definitely give books away.  I enjoyed this short book and am glad I finally read it.

Book Review: Tisha by Robert Specht

Tisha:  The Story of a Young Teacher in the Alaska Wilderness

As Told To:  Robert Specht

Publisher:  Bantam (1976)

342 pages

Genre:  Non-fiction, Memoir

"I've lived in the Forty Mile country of Alaska for a long time, but even now, every so often when I'm out rock-hunting or looking for fossils, I get lost.  Sometimes I'll have to wander around for a while before I get my bearings.  That's what happened to me when I first started to think about telling this story.  I wasn't sure which direction to take, until I finally realized that the only way to tell it was the way I might have told it when I first came to Alaska."

The year was 1927.  Anne Hobbs was nineteen years old when she was offered the job of teaching school in a gold-mining settlement near Yukon Territory in Alaska.  Since the time she was a young girl, the idea of living on a frontier was exciting to her.  So, of course, she took the job.  

The story reads like a novel and tells about Anne's first year of teaching in Alaska.  It begins with the journey to Chicken and ends when the school year has finished.  The journey was much more difficult than she imagined.  And when she arrived in Chicken and was shown to her living quarters, she was confronted with an empty room and had to ask the women escorting her if she could have a bed.  Thankfully, it was just an oversight and a bed was brought right away.  

As Anne begins teaching classes at the one-room school, she is confronted with some things she didn't expect.  One is that the school is intended only for white children.  So when she invites a native child into the classroom, many of the townspeople are upset and tell her she can't do that.  Another is that some of the "old-timers" drop by and sit in on class.  This doesn't create much of a problem and the children find their stories interesting.  Throughout the year, Anne is confronted with the prejudice that is rampant in the area.  She tries to do what she feels is right, even if it means she won't be allowed to teach next year. 

I enjoyed this story.  I learned much about Alaska including the harshness of the winters and how people survive during them.  I found Anne's teaching style interesting and some of the things she  did reminded me of when I was homeschooling my children.  She understood that if they were to learn, they needed to be interested in what they were doing.  This led her to create a project that they could all work on together that involved making a map of Chicken and learning the history of the town.  

At the beginning of the story, I felt like I was missing something.  There wasn't much information given about Anne before this year of teaching which left me feeling like I had entered the story in the middle.  I would have liked to know a little more about Anne before she went to Alaska.  But that was a minor thing and didn't take too much away from the narrative. 

If you are looking for an adventure story with a female heroine, or would like to know more about Alaska in the 1920's, I recommend this book.

Book Review: On Writing by Stephen King

On Writing:  A Memoir of the Craft

Author:  Stephen King

Publisher:  Scribner (2010) (first published 2000)

291 pages

Genre:  Non-fiction, Writing, Memoir

"What follows is an attempt to put down, briefly and simply, how I came to the craft, what I know about it now, and how it's done.  It's about the day job; it's about the language."

I have only read one Stephen King book in my life and that was just after graduating from high school.  Horror is not a genre that I read.  However, I heard good things about this book and decided to give it a try.  I was not disappointed.  

The book is divided into three sections.  The first section is titled,  "C.V." and is King's curriculum vitae.  He explains it as his, "attempt to show how one writer was formed."  The chapter is made up of episodes in his life that involved writing or led him to want to write.  He writes chronologically from his earliest memories to those more recent.  Rather than divide this part into chapters, each memory is numbered and this helps break them up.  One of the things that stood out to me was that Stephen King was always a reader.  Near the end of this first section he is describing the place you read as, "one where you go to receive telepathic messages."  He goes on to say, 

"Not that you have to be there; books are a uniquely portable magic.  I usually listen to one in the car (always unabridged; I think abridged audiobooks are the pits), and carry another wherever I go.  You just never know when you'll want an escape hatch:  mile-long lines at tollbooth plazas, the fifteen minutes you have to spend in the hall of some boring college building waiting for your advisor ... , airport boarding lounges, laundromats on rainy afternoons ..."

The second section is called, "Toolbox".  This is where he gives direction on the writing craft.  This section is also separated by numbers rather than chapters.  He walks the reader through the process of writing in a way that makes it interesting even if you never intend to write anything.  He begins with this:

"If you want to be a writer, you must do two things above all others:  read a lot and write a lot.  There's no way around these two things that I'm aware of, no shortcut."

The third section is called, "On Living:  A Postscript".  King was hit by a van while walking near his summer house in June of 1999.  He tells that story in section three.  The final section of the book is called, "And Furthermore".  It contains Parts I, II, and III which include;  a short piece of writing in the first draft followed by a revised version of the same piece and two lists of books Stephen King has read in the last several years.

I enjoyed this book and am glad I read it.  King loves what he does and loves stories and that definitely comes through in the book.  I would recommend this book even if you aren't interested in learning to write.  It helped me to understand stories and writing better even as a reader.

A consideration:  the book contains language and vulgarity throughout.  If you are offended by that, you may want to skip this one. 

Book Review: Stillmeadow Daybook by Gladys Taber

Stillmeadow Daybook
Author:  Gladys Taber
Publisher:  J. P. Lippincott (1955)
274 pages
Genre:  Non-fiction, memoir

"Early morning is like a pink pearl now that April's here.  The first lilacs are budding over the white picket fence in the Quiet Garden; crocus, daffodils, white and purple grape hyacinths repeat the magic of spring.  Surely never was spring so wonderful, such a miracle!"

Stillmeadow Daybook takes us month by month through a year of living at Stillmeadow.  Located on forty acres in the countryside of Connecticut, it served as an escape from the city for Mrs. Taber and her family as well as the family of her good friend Jill.  Now it is home to Gladys and Jill, as they are both widows with grown children.  They spend their days keeping their home, gardening, raising and showing Cocker Spaniels, cooking, visiting with friends and family and enjoying the beauty that surrounds them. 

"And when we lost our husbands, the farm was a refuge and a haven, something to hold fast to.  And something we had to work for, which was a blessing.  By then we were raising all our vegetables, and we had thirty-six cockers.  We were raising puppies, doing a little showing, and were really very busy.  After all, I reflected, Stillmeadow isn't a house and land, it is a way of living."

Each chapter is a month which reads like a letter from an old friend.  This book begins in April and ends in March.  I began the book in September and my intention was to read a chapter per month.  I didn't do it perfectly, but stayed pretty close to the month we were in.  As I have mentioned before, I love details of daily life included in stories.  Well, this is an entire book of the details of daily life!  So, you won't be surprised to find that the Stillmeadow books are some of my favorites.  I have learned much about running my own home, gleaned ideas for meals and laughed out loud as I read about life at Stillmeadow. 

Gladys Taber lived with her husband and daughter in an apartment in New York.  Her husband was a teacher and she was working at Columbia, hoping to get a degree.  Mrs. Taber wrote stories and articles for Redbook, The Saturday Evening Post and Ladies Home Journal.  She wrote several books, many with Stillmeadow in the title.

If you enjoy the details of daily life in writing, are interested in country life or life in the 1950's in Connecticut, I recommend this book or any in the Stillmeadow series. 

Book Review: Safe Passage by Ida Cook

Safe Passage

Author:  Ida Cook

Publisher:  Harlequin (2008, first published 1950)

287 pages

"An autobiography should, I suppose, begin at the beginning of one's life.  So - I was born in Sunderland, Durham, the second daughter in a middle-class family of two girls and two boys.  My father was an officer and later a surveyor of Customs and Excise.  As this work entailed a good deal of moving, we four children were all born in different parts of England.  In spite of this, there was always a tremendous sense of stability in our family life."

Safe Passage is, as the subtitle suggests, "The remarkable true story of two sisters who rescued Jews from the Nazis".  When Ida and her sister, Louise, were young women, they developed a love for opera.  At that time they were both working and still living at home.  They began saving money so that they could attend performances at Covent Garden.   Ida boldly sent letters to their favorite stars and was surprised to hear back from some of them.  The sisters became friends with some of the stars and began attending performances outside of England, in other parts of Europe and even the United States.  It was this travel that put them in the perfect position to be able to help refugees get out of dangerous places and into places were they could start a new life.  They never set out to do this, but just fell into it as one of their opera star friends asked them to accompany a friend of theirs to England.  Only later did they really understand what they were doing.  

The Cook family was living in London when the war broke out.  They had finally convinced their mother to stay with relatives in a safer location.  Mr. Cook volunteered with the Home Defense Service as an air-raid warden, both of the brothers were enlisted in the army.  Louise's office had been evacuated to Wales for the first year of the war.  So, Ida and her father were the only family members left in London during the war.  Ida volunteered for night duty at an East End shelter.  Her descriptions of the bombings and of the people she met are fascinating.  

After the war was over, Ida and Louise continued to help displaced people by working with refugees in camps.  I found this interesting as this was an aspect of the war that I didn't know much about.  

"Most of our work consisted of fund-raising for daily fresh milk provision for children under six, or helping to provide treatment and rehabilitation for the many tuberculosis cases.  But we did sometimes go out to visit our camp, and so we came to know some of our cases personally, as well as the wonderful personnel who worked on the spot."

Both of the sisters have such hearts for people of all kinds.  Neither of them ever married, but their family and friends played a large part in their lives.  Their love for others shines through in all of the events related in the book and makes this a heartwarming, enjoyable read.

If you like first-hand accounts of World War II or historical autobiographies, I would recommend this book.  If you are interested in the history of Opera, you will enjoy this book.  If you are just looking for a great story, I would recommend this book.