A Delicate Truth
By John Le Carré
Because governments are so inefficient at everything, and making war is expensive, why not privatize the military? With tongue in cheek, John Le Carré, master spy novelist, attacks that question in A Delicate Truth. Set in Britain and Gibraltar circa 2008, this story shows what might happen if England’s Junior Foreign Minister answered “Yes” to privatizing the armed forces and military intelligence. The Junior Minister in question (a pugilistic Scot named Fergus Quinn) does so by stealth with an American-British military contractor, Ethical Outcomes (don’t you just love corporate branding?).
The result of their first joint operation, which is to extract a high-profile Islamist terrorist from Gibraltar, is, well...inefficient: they can’t even find the terrorist, but Ethical’s trigger-happy mercenaries gun down an innocent Muslim woman and her child. Furthermore, the fallout puts a career Special Forces soldier into guilt, poverty, and deep depression for not being able to save the two innocents. From there, two British bureaucrats then struggle to right this wrong, at great cost to their own careers and personal safety.
For me, this book was a page-turner, but the moral quandaries of the two bureaucrats—young Toby Bell, Private Secretary to the Junior Foreign Minister, and sixty-year-old Kit Probyn, who was the Minister’s “eyes and ears” at the ill-fated Gibraltar mission—fill every sentence with tension. I was forced to think, “What would I have the guts to do in this situation?”
Toby and Kit act with integrity against the odds, and the results are chilling, if effective. Le Carré (interviewed on CBC radio) has said this novel is a symbolic study in miniature of Britain’s involvement in the Iraq War. So while I was on the edge of my seat reading A Delicate Truth, the story is also a practical warning and a morality tale for “inefficient” governments everywhere.
- Bob Young
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The Panopticon
Jenni Fagan
What kind of meaning gets created and what sort of choices are perceived when one is born into nothing, without family, without resources, without love? What happens when you are raised, wholly and completely, within a system that appears to have little interest in truly helping you and yet eagerly watches for—and expects—your next failure? This is the experiment created by Jenni Fagan; these are the questions that get answered in The Panopticon.
The panopticon was the brainchild of Jeremy Bentham, an eighteenth-century social philosopher. Designed as a semi-circular prison with a central watchtower, it was conceived so that all prisoners could be potentially watched at all times without them ever being certain when they were being observed.
In Jenni Fagan's book, no one is so sure of being watched as Anais Hendricks. The panopticon of the novel is now a residence for troubled youth, and is Anais’s latest stop in a long history. That history includes thirty-eight social workers and fifty-one placements by the age of fifteen, plus over one hundred police charges in the last sixteen months. Not to mention a policewoman in a coma, with only a hazy and drug-addled recollection by Anais of the events of the day or how she got blood on her skirt. By the numbers, one might argue that Anais is very troubled indeed; the careful observer might also notice that beneath her apparently troubled exterior lies an astonishing awareness of humanity and a set of well-developed and fiercely held morals.
The Panopticon is a fantastically well-written first novel. In Anais Hendricks, Jenni Fagan has created an intricate and insightfully drawn protagonist who is struggling to find meaning, connection, place, and family. Fagan's dialogue is brilliantly written, her characters are deftly drawn and yet wonderfully complex, and she casts an unflinching eye on what are often torturous events and painful truths. The Panopticon can in places be a very difficult book to read, and it is tempting at times to look away. It is a book that is not afraid to explore the depths of darkness and despair or to cast a casual eye over activities of unspeakable cruelty; it also has the capacity to find beauty and hope, and to hold out the possibility of redemption and reinvention. In the end, it is an exceptional book that ultimately rewards the persistent reader.
- Mark Mullaly
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Eleanor and Park
Rainbow Rowell
I am sitting at my computer trying to come up with some witty words to entice you to read Eleanor and Park, but all I can come up with is “Oh my God, read it!” because seriously, you must read this book!
Set in 1986 Omaha, Eleanor and Park is a powerful story of forbidden love between Park, a half-Korean boy from a good family, and Eleanor, a full-figured girl struggling to survive life with her abusive step-father. Issues of bullying, race, gender, and class distinction come together to make this story good, but what takes it from good to amazing is the sad horror of Eleanor’s home life and the world-changing first love between these two teenagers.
Their love is just so heart-melting! It will leave you swooning for those exhilarating yet terrifying days of young love—first looks, first touches, stolen kisses...*Sigh*
At once harsh and lovely, tender and bittersweet, this book burrowed deep into my heart and there it will stay. Beautifully written and incredibly moving, Eleanor and Park is an unforgettable read that I can’t recommend enough. This is contemporary YA at its best.
- Danielle Webster
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M in the Abstract
Douglas Davey
M in the Abstract, by Douglas Davey, is an enticing page-turner in ways that you wouldn't normally expect. It's about things we can all relate to: Acceptance. Courage. A secret you don't want anyone knowing. Davey’s book tells the story of how Mary, a girl haunted by a secret, begins to question the thing that has burdened her for so long. The words leap off the page as the reader is confronted with a whirlwind of strong emotions. You can't help but feel sad, or lonely, or proud as you watch Mary’s journey play out before your eyes. There's a moment where something great unfolds and you say, "Wow." I did just that reading this book. Hats off to the author.
- Athme Sivapalan
Athme is a member of the Brampton Library's Teen Library Council. You can also read Athme's Q&A with Douglas Davey on our Bookstore Blog.
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The Ocean at the End of the Lane
Neil Gaiman
Neil Gaiman may be the most respected author moving freely between comics and prose. And although The Ocean at the End of the Lane lacks some of the soaring, epic scope of the Sandman series or American Gods, fans of Gaiman’s previous works will not likely be disappointed by the imagination, insight, and emotional power of this new short novel.
A man returns to his childhood home in Sussex for a funeral and decides to visit the nearby farm of an imaginative girl he knew many years before. While there, he recalls a series of incidents from when he was seven years old that cascaded together to invoke forces, worldly and otherwise, much larger than he could understand.
Gaiman’s narrative unfolds with a strong vein of truth, bolstered both by the unshakeable certainties and the vast, terrifying uncertainties of youth. The book’s genre might be called urban fantasy, or magical realism, or even horror, but most of all the story is about the mutability of memory and how frightening and lonely it can be to be a child in a grown up world. The book is so well-written and poignant, however, that it also cannot help but remind us that adults have not become more knowledgeable so much as we have learned to suppress the fear and awe which may be the greatest wisdom of childhood. This is a spectacular, powerful read from a true modern master.
- Bill Cameron
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Grandmother Power: A Global Phenomenon
Paola Gianturco
Reading this book will cement forever your sense of gratitude to the gutsy, confident grandmothers of the world. Story after story told in the compelling words of activist grandmothers will amaze you.
Paola Gianturco has brought to light how grandmothers are using their determination and passion to make their communities a better place for grandchildren. She has discovered that grandmothers everywhere share an attitude of “not good enough for my grandchildren.” Grandmothers are tackling whatever issue is most important to them locally. They are intellectually sharp and unapologetic about their opinions. A global grandmother movement is indeed unfolding.
Gianturco’s full-colour images of activist grandmothers are captivating. Each chapter tells stories of grandmothers changing their communities in their own unique ways. One chapter focuses on grassroots grandmother organizations caring for AIDS orphans in Africa. In India, grandmothers are bringing light to villages that have no electricity by learning how to be solar engineers. Grandmothers in Senegal convince communities to abandon female genital mutilation. Argentine grandmothers continue their forty-year search for grandchildren who were kidnapped during the nation’s military dictatorship. In Peru, Thailand, and Laos, grandmothers preserve weaving traditions and awaken local pride in their communities’ centuries-old heritage. Stories about grannies in Ireland are a delight.
Grandmother Power won the 2013 International Book Award for Multicultural Non-Fiction. You do not have to be a grandmother to appreciate this book. It is a work that will inspire us all, a celebration of the human spirit.
- Sharon Ogden
Paola Gianturco will be showing her photos and speaking about the remarkable grandmothers she has encountered on Thursday, September 19, 7:00 p.m. at the Elora Legion, an event hosted by the Grandmothers of the Grand. Tickets are available for $10.00 at the following outlets: Roxanne's Reflections Book Store and St. Andrew's Church in Fergus, The Elora Centre for the Arts, The Book Shelf in Guelph, Wordsworth Book Store in Waterloo.
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Still Alice
Lisa Genova
Alice Howland is a professor of psychology at Harvard specializing in the mechanisms of language and cognition. She is young, accomplished, and extremely intelligent. And she has early-onset Alzheimer’s disease. Still Alice is the story of her agonizing decline, from the simple forgetting of a word during a routine lecture to her inability to recognize her youngest daughter.
Soon after her diagnosis, Alice takes a seat in a lecture hall at Harvard, waiting for the lecturer to arrive. After a lengthy wait with no sign of the speaker, Alice loses patience and walks out, leaving a class full of confused students behind. Unbeknownst to her degenerating brain, she was the lecturer that everybody was waiting for. Alice’s calm and intelligent narrative makes it easy to forget that she is declining mentally, and I found myself burning with discomfort when I realized her mistake.
Throughout the book, Alice is forced to painfully prioritize the things in her life that she wants to accomplish before she is no longer capable of meaningful accomplishment. As her disease progresses and she becomes a spectator in her own life, her relationships begin to dissolve when others take a pragmatic, insensitive approach to coping with her disease, oftentimes forgetting that she is a person, not a disorder. Still Alice sheds light on the fact that neurodegenerative disorders are still widely misunderstood and stigmatized, and that victims are often further victimized by societal insensitivity and fear.
Still Alice incorporates enough factual information about Alzheimer’s disease to bring life and believability to the story without suffocating it in scientific terminology. It is an unforgettable read that won’t be easy to put down.
- Laura Martin
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NOS4A2
Joe Hill
Welcome to Christmasland!
When I heard Joe Hill had a new book coming out, I practically did cart-wheels and made sure to snag a copy of N0S4A2 (Nosforatu) right away. The book opens with a spooky feeling that is classic Hill.
The story is about a girl by the name of Vic McQueen and her Raleigh bicycle, which takes her down secret roads. She finds the Shorter Way Bridge: a cross-dimensional bridge that takes her to different places. All she has to do is think of them and ride across. Of course, not everything is sunshine and lollipops for Vic. Vic’s son Wayne is kidnapped by Charles Talent Manx the Third—a child murderer who takes his victims to Christmasland.
Christmasland. Manx’s slaughterhouse. Here the reader will find a macabre foundation for the supernatural events that take place in Hill’s novel: a maze of massive pines decorated with bloody ornaments, dead children with razor blades dripping with fresh gore, the kind Ed Gein would be proud of. Hill pumps out another gruesome, blood-thirsty boogeyman slinking around and laughing maniacally, one that even Freddy Krueger would be scared of.
Hill is a fantastic writer who uses every facet of craziness and morbidity he has. Throughout the book there are references to comic book superheroes (which scored high with this reader) and his writing style is similar to the one he uses in his graphic novel series Locke & Key. In N0S4A2 you will find the spot-on art work of Gabriel Rodriguez, who also works with Hill on L&K. Rodriguez adds a simple but much-needed artistic touch to the story of N0S4A2.
Wow, I mean Wow! Hill is creepy, sadistic, and sick. This is definitely not a book for grandma, unless grandma likes the horrific, gut-wrenching, morbid side of things. Then have at it! Not for the faint at heart. This book has completely ripped me apart and shoved me down a sewer grate with Hill’s father’s pal, Pennywise.
- Jason Pereira
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Fly Away
Kristin Hannah
It had been a few years since I'd read Firefly Lane, but Kristin Hannah’s follow-up novel Fly Away brought me right back into the lives of Tully Hart and Kate Ryan, best friends since they first met at fourteen years old. While I do think this is a stand-alone book, having read Firefly Lane first will offer a richer understanding of the characters and the intricacies of their relationships.
Life has not been easy for the Ryan family or Tully since Kate Ryan lost her battle with cancer. Fly Away finds us in September, four years later, when Tully crashes her car and lands in the hospital in serious condition. Much of the novel takes place on that one day, as the characters flashback over the last four years and reflect on how they have all come to be at Tully’s bedside. It is dark and difficult at times, but when is the aftermath of the death of a dearly loved wife, mother, and friend not difficult?
At its core, this novel is about trust and forgiveness, and how our pride can get in the way of our own truth. This disparity between the prideful “I’m fine” outward self and the truth of the despair internally is evident, particularly between Tully and Johnny. As I read, I kept returning to a quote I heard years ago: “Don’t compare your inside to someone else’s outside.” What we project to the world is not always our internal truth, and Hannah’s characters all have to come to terms with this throughout the course of the novel.
- Sarah Gardiner
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A Dark Redemption
Stav Sherez
I am well aware that it is very bad form to judge a book by its cover. However, having finished A Dark Redemption by Stav Sherez, I fully understand why such a dark and mysterious image of Big Ben and the River Thames was chosen as the artwork for his latest crime novel.
The London presented in this book is not that of pomp, postcards, and holiday photographs. Sherez probes its sinister underworld as Detective Jack Carrigan investigates the brutally violent murder of a Ugandan student, Grace Okello. Sherez grew up in London and effectively communicates the difficulties of the city’s multiculturalism, the challenges of assimilation, and the ongoing conflicts caused by Britain’s history of colonialism.
The author also draws our attention to the ongoing cycle of violence, systematic rape of women, and training of child soldiers perpetrated by Joseph Kony’s Lord’s Resistance Army in Uganda, which many Facebook crusaders focused on for a few weeks last year. One of the larger questions posed by Sherez’s book is why such a lot of time and resources are devoted to solving one murder in London when the West expresses such apathy towards the plight of thousands in East Africa. Is it only when such violence is witnessed first-hand that we sit up and take notice?
The novel interweaves the present day (2012) and “back then,” when Carrigan, fresh out of university, travelled to Uganda for the adventure of a lifetime with his two best friends, one of who never came home. The full details of this element of the storyline are revealed in tantalizing stages, which maintains the intrigue and suspense of an engaging plot.
As such, A Dark Redemption is as much about ongoing friendships, the loss of youthful innocence, and Carrigan exercising old demons as it is about uncovering the reasons behind Grace’s murder. Along with his second-in-command, Geneva Miller, Carrigan will discover that the truth of the past that so haunts him is vital to solving this case. He is dedicated to the point of obsession, and while this has alienated him from his colleagues, readers will be drawn to him.
There is more to come from Stav Sherez and DI Jack Carrigan and I, for one, eagerly await the next installment in what is a promising new crime series.
- Matt Anderson
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Whistling Past the Graveyard
Susan Crandall
An intensely moving story of growth and the creation of identity, Susan Crandall’s Whistling Past the Graveyard is dark and compelling, with flashes of light and compassion that will inspire you.
Set in the American South in the early 1960s, a time of great fear and great privilege, of hushed stories and county fairs, Whistling Past the Graveyard tells the story of nine-year-old Starla as she discovers the realities of her life and the lives of those around her.
Fleeing her grandmother’s home on a hot and dusty Mississippi road, Starla embarks on a journey to find her mother, a person who has been both a defining force and a glaring absence in her life. Exhausted and suddenly very alone, Starla accepts a ride from Eula, a black woman travelling alone with a white baby. This is the beginning of a journey that will forever change Starla, Eula, and all who read this beautifully crafted book. With entire sections that will either take your breath away or make you hold it in suspense, Susan Crandall has contributed a stunning new work that narrates the struggle for rights, justice, community, and family and joins the likes of The Help, The Kitchen House, and The Secret Life of Bees.
- Lindsay Klassen
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I Wear the Black Hat
Chuck Klosterman
We have a complicated relationship with villainy. On one hand, villains are the one thing we’re all allowed to hate. Hitler? Of course. O.J.? Depending on what you believe, yes. The Eagles? Sure. But what about the villains we hate without thinking about it too closely, hate because they want us to hate them, hate because we’re supposed to hate them?
In I Wear the Black Hat, Chuck Klosterman explores our concept of villains, delving into why we hate who we hate. In some cases, it’s very clear: Person A does bad things and thusly do we consider them a villain (Hitler, for example). These instances are rare and, according to Klosterman, not that telling. In fact, his principal argument for what constitutes a villain isn't the sum of their ill deeds at all. Rather, Klosterman’s working definition of a villain is a person who “knows the most, but cares the least” in a given scenario.
This revelation is perhaps a better fit with a grown-up idea of villains--those who still hold to the Saturday Morning Cartoon Standard notwithstanding. Having freed us from a rigid interpretation of villainy, Klosterman frees himself to examine its nature by degrees and by definitions. He’s able to consider topics that vary from the various villains of the Clinton scandal (the one with the cigar) to the problems associated with a real-life Batman to the sympathetic villainy of Chevy Chase.
And that’s what makes villainy so fascinating. It’s by turns repugnant, mystifying, and seductive, but it’s always compelling. We want to watch, even if we don’t like what we see. That’s worth considering. And it’s definitely worth reading.
- Danny Williamson
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We’re All a Little Bit Crazy: Removing the Stigma of Mental Illness
Stuart A. Ross
Whether it’s midterm season, taking care of the family, or the stresses of the workplace, haven’t we all wondered at some point if we’re just a little bit crazy? Dr. Stuart A. Ross explores this very topic in his book We’re All A Little Bit Crazy. Fortunately, the book is written for the non-specialist, casual reader who is interested in learning about this fascinating and relevant subject.
Dr. Ross’s hypothesis is that no one is really intrinsically crazier than anyone else and that it is our formative environments and experiences that largely shape our mental health. Instead of seeing those struggling with mental health as outcasts, we should realize that such patients could have been any one of us under different circumstances. Some of us—whether through a healthy upbringing or sheer genetics—are fortunate enough to achieve more optimal mental health. Others, traumatized by childhood abuse and difficulties, are far more likely to develop psychological disorders. This is a simple yet powerful message that Dr. Ross supports with his own observations based on his years of experience with many patients and the latest research in mental health.
We’re All A Little Crazy highlights that there should be no stigma associated with mental health. Mental health problems are very real and present issues and the victim should not be blamed. Dr. Ross describes many horrific cases of individuals who have endured trauma while growing up and the psychological problems that they have developed as a result. One realizes that anyone who has undergone such trauma would have enormous difficulty achieving mental health. As Dr. Ross notes at the outset of the book, he includes some descriptions of situations and experiences that may be disturbing. Nevertheless, this is a succinct and eye-opening look into the horrors that many people around us must live and cope with.
Written in a refreshingly simple, honest, yet considered manner, Dr. Ross bridges the gap between the general public and the enigmatic profession of mental health treatment. Reading this book has personally helped me realize how fortunate I am to have had a relatively healthy upbringing. By the same token, after reading this book, I am also more comfortable coming to terms with the darker moments of my life, which have had an equally valid impact in shaping who I am today. Ultimately, I think that Dr. Ross’s book is such a valuable read because it reinforces our shared humanity, a sufficient reason to argue against judging one another based on any criteria.
- Mike Fan
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Cooked
Michael Pollan
Whipping up a constant firestorm of criticism from the giants who marshal the industrial food system, the infamous Michael Pollan is at it again in Cooked, his new visionary statement on what could be the food revolution (move over Naked Chef).
Divvied up according to the four classical elements of fire (barbeque), wind (bread), water (braising), and earth (fermenting), Cooked is a well-researched, intricately woven call to sharpen your knife, power down your pad/pod/device, and venture into the heart of darkness: your home kitchen.
Aware and appropriately apologetic about the gender implications of any “return to the kitchen” statement, Pollan embarks on a thoughtfully curated series of one-on-one cooking “classes” with food leaders that will help to secure his point.
Calling on the greatnesses of Ed Mitchell (a pit-master legend in the whole-hog roasting world from North Carolina), Samin Nosrat (an Iranian-born, Chez Panisse-trained chef), Chad Robertson (surfer/yeast-whisperer and proprietor of the sourdough bread baking institution Tartine in California), and Sandor Katz (long regarded as the father of ferments), Pollan sharpens his investigative journalism teeth by biting into these gnarly realms of food preparation.
His point: by cooking at home from real ingredients, you have a very real opportunity to bypass the global industrial food system, improve your health, and, ultimately, build community.
The pearl in this book isn’t so much Pollan’s musings on his newly acquired cooking techniques, but his powerful and clear discourse on the state of the larger global food system that’s currently at play. Detailing the intricacies behind the production of a raw milk cheese may not have you buying a cow, but it will enlighten you about how to practice patience and be present for your onion dicing.
Alas, any effort I make to have you spend time reading this book is, in itself, counter to Pollan’s own assertion that we need to spend more quality time in the kitchen. But if you’re challenged by the task of cooking for yourself, this should be required reading over the summer. For heaven’s sake, any work that helps to fight the industry responsible for this run-amok system of “food-like-substance” manufacturing is time well spent!
- Christopher Jess
Christopher Jess is a trained chef who now runs a high school culinary arts program in Fergus. A great admirer of Pollan, he’s built much of his curriculum around Pollan’s work and is planning to host a Michael Pollan-themed dinner series this July and August as tribute.
Michael Pollen will be reading at the University of Guelph on September 14 as part of the Eden Mills Writers' Festival.
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And the Mountains Echoed
Khaled Hosseini
Khaled Hosseini’s third novel, And the Mountains Echoed, explores the fractured history and collective memories of his native homeland and the survivor’s guilt that accompanies those who have chosen to leave a country embroiled in perpetual turmoil. As the title suggests, the novel is a continuation of the author’s searing observations about post-conflict Afghanistan and its population, which is repeatedly exposed to a violence that reverberates throughout time and space. The ever-present, immovable mountains of Afghanistan bear silent witness to the multigenerational echoes of pain imposed upon their people.
The novel begins with an elegiac retelling of folkloric tales involving fairies, jinns, and divs (demonic giants), constructing a recurrent theme that makes the book, in Hosseini's words, “like a fairytale turned on its head.” His contemporary rendition of the archetypal fairytale chronicles the seemingly disparate, yet profoundly interconnected lives of people affected by Russian and North American militaristic intervention. The threads of his story dangle from numerous characters and situations, and eventually enmesh to create an interwoven tapestry of human suffering, forgiveness, and absolution.
Hosseini captures the anguish and humanity of the country he loved and left, and conveys it to the reader with a pervasive beauty that bleeds onto each page. It is impossible not to see the world with enlightened eyes once you’ve reached the novel’s gripping conclusion. I highly recommend this book for its structural complexities, which keep you guessing until the final sentence, as well as the transformative experience that its characters and narrative will undoubtedly impress upon you.
- Lee Puddephatt
PS If you're interested in And the Mountains Echoed, you can also visit the The Echo Project, a lovely interactive companion to Hosseini's book with digital images and other online content--one piece for each page of the novel.
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A Tale for the Time Being
Ruth Ozeki
I remember finding a letter on the Elizabeth Street bridge, a single torn page revealing the pain of love. There was no name at the top, no addressee, but there was a "you": you who changed my life and made me so happy, but now so sad because you dumped me. And like Ozeki's character Ruth in A Tale for the Time Being, I could tell from the shape of those hard-pressed blue words that it was a letter written by a young hand. My immediate response to this letter was empathy, and I worried if the person who wrote it was OK. Now, if this single page had been a diary, which is what Ruth finds washed up on the beach in a Hello Kitty lunchbox, I too would have become obsessed.
Diaries are intimate expressions of thought and experience that connect us to our humanity. They reveal our strengths and weaknesses, our cruelties and power. Ozeki's use of a diary within a novel develops a parallel narrative structure that thoroughly engages the reader, because all you want is more: more about Nao, the diary writer; more about Ruth, the diary reader, who happens to be a writer; more about Nao's great grandmother, a 104-year-old Zen Buddhist nun; more Japanese words; more of Ruth’s Internet searches to alleviate some of the anxiety you feel for these characters, because there are serious things happening in the novel--bullying, attempted suicide, prostitution.
In an online interview, Ozeki, responding to a question about where writers find their inspiration, says that A Tale for the Time Being is about a “character creating a novelist.” The idea of co-creation between readers and writers is familiar to me, but Ozeki explores this idea from a unique perspective. Playing with the idea of inserting herself into her own novel, Ozeki creates an “avatar” to discover the truth about where she, as a writer, gets her inspiration. What she discovers is that a character’s voice brings a novelist into being, because this voice leads you to your deepest thoughts and gives them form. This extraordinary novel from a Japanese-American writer who is a Zen Buddhist priest includes footnotes, appendices, and Buddhist teachings and guidelines for practice to give the reader a complete picture of how a novel is created.
- Morvern McNie
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