chaotic compendiums

Let's Talk about Afternoon Tea

2012-01-29T14:30:00.000-08:00

Traditional English Afternoon Tea (image source)

Who doesn't love the notion of afternoon tea? All the pastries and finger sandwiches and whatnot delicately placed on the best china with lace napkins and a gorgeous tea set? This is the stuff that little girls (at least if they were me) play at. I read a fair amount of British children's books growing up, so the concept of afternoon tea was a familiar one. I had a sweet little tea set and, although I did not like dolls, my stuffed animals and I utilized this (along with our collective imaginations) frequently. Since I'm reading Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte, written during the Victorian era, I thought I'd share this wonderful, yummy thing to make for a special tea.

My Seattle grandmother often made afternoon tea when I visited her growing up. We would sit in her gorgeous living room looking out at Capitol Hill and the rain (all too frequent), have our fancy tea, and read our books. These afternoons are among the fondest of my memories of her.

This recipe comes from Eras of Elegance - visit it for all kinds of historical menus:

Plain scones with lemon curd and clotted cream
(image source)

Scones with Lemon Curd and Clotted Cream

Scones are traditionally served with afternoon tea and accompanied by lemon curd and clotted cream. You can add a variety of treats into the batter, such as raisins, fresh apple bits, orange peel, cranberries, and chocolate chips. Lemon Curd is a traditional spread for scones, and is usually served with Devonshire (or clotted) cream. Our lemon curd is rich and smooth, and can be kept refrigerated for up to two weeks. Unfortunately, Americans cannot make clotted cream or Devonshire cream, as we do not have the same breed of cows as in England. Instead of buying an expensive import, ERAS offers a simple recipe for clotted cream, which is perfect for spreading on scones.

    2 cups flour
    1 tablespoon baking powder
    1 cup and 2 tablespoons sugar
    1/2 teaspoon salt
    6 tablespoons butter
    1/2 cup buttermilk (or milk)
    1 lightly beaten egg
    2 large eggs
    1/2 cup lemon juice
    1/4 cup butter
    1 cup heavy cream
    2 tablespoons Confectioner's sugar
    1/2 cup sour cream

    To make scones:
    1. Mix baking powder, 2 tablespoons sugar and salt and cut in 6 tablespoons of butter until the mix is crumbly.
    2. Pour in the buttermilk until the dough is sticky. Be careful not to overmix. The dough should cling together.
    3. Turn out onto a floured surface and shape drop or use a biscuit cutter to form biscuit sized scones. The secret of tender scones is a minimum of handling.
    4. Place on an ungreased cookie sheet and brush with egg for a shiny brown scone.
    5. Bake at 425 degrees for 10-20 minutes, until light brown.

    To make lemon curd:
    1. Wisk 1 cup sugar and 2 large eggs in a bowl until blended.
    2. Sift in 1/2 cup fresh lemon juice.
    3. Pour into a saucepan and cook over low-medium heat stirring constantly for 20 minutes. Do not let the mixture come to a boil (lest it curdle or burn), but allow it to gradually thicken.
    4. When the mixture thickly coats the back of a metal spoon, remove pan from heat and stire in 1/4 cup butter until melted.
    5. Pour the mixture into a bowl and cover with plastic wrap. Refrigerate the mixture for at least 4 hours. The lemon curd will thicken as it cools.

    To make clotted cream:
    1. Mix 1 cup heavy cream and 2 tablespoons Confectioner's sugar using an electric mixer. Whip until stiff peaks form.
    2. Gently fold in sour cream and mix until thick.
    3. Place in refrigerator and chill until time to serve. If made ahead of time, it will keep in the refrigerator up to 4 hours.

Weekend Cooking    is open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share: Book    (novel, nonfiction) reviews, cookbook reviews, movie reviews, recipes,   random thoughts, gadgets, fabulous quotations, photographs. If your post is even vaguely foodie, feel free to grab the button and link up   anytime over the weekend. Please link to your specific post, not your   blog's home page. For more information, see the welcome post.

Book Review - The Hunter by John Lescroart

2012-01-26T06:00:00.000-08:00

Synopsis: Raised by loving adoptive parents, San Francisco private investigator Wyatt Hunt never had an interest in finding his birth family-until he gets a chilling text message from an unknown number: "How did ur mother die?"

The answer is murder, and urged on by curiosity and the mysterious texter, Hunt takes on a case he never knew existed, one that has lain unsolved for decades. His family's dark past unfurls in dead ends. Child Protective Services, who suspected but could never prove that Hunt was being neglected, is uninformed; his birth father, twice tried but never convicted of the murder, is in hiding; Evie, his mother's drug-addicted religious fanatic of a friend, is untraceable. And who is the texter, and how are they connected to Hunt?

Yet in the present, time is running out. The texter, who insists the killer is out there, refuses to be identified. The cat-and-mouse game leads Hunt across the country and eventually to places far more exotic-and far more dangerous. As the chase escalates, so does the threat, for the killer has a secret that can only be trusted to the grave. Thriller master John Lescroart weaves a shocking, suspenseful tale about the skeletons inside family closets . . . and the mortal danger outside the front door.

First Line: They were having the special, wings and tuna wontons, in a window booth at Lou the Greek's, two guys in their early forties, talking over the lunchtime noise.

Random Quote: Juhle and Sarah, on folding chairs in front of Glitsky's death, exchanged a look and Juhle, nodding, got up and walked a few steps over to the door, which he closed. When he got back to his seat, he cleared his throat and then he came forward and spoke up in a new whisper, "Abe, what if this has got something to do with cops?"

Review: A lot of people weren't pleased when John Lescroart started writing a series about Wyatt Hunt, a San Francisco private investigator. After all, his Dismas Hardy/Abe Glitzsky books are so imminently satisfying who else could we want to know about?

I like Wyatt Hunt. I like the interconnections between the characters in both series. I like the acknowledgement that Dismas and Abe are aging, their lives are changing and settling down, and it might be time to tell some new stories. Since this is one of my all-time favorite series, I was happy to see that rather than letting the series wander off into insignificance and no fun, Lescroart expanded his world a bit, reached out into other characters with other stories. This keeps all of the characters and their stories fresh and prevents Lescroart of going the way of so many series writers who run out of ideas and turn their characters into caricatures (once again, Patricia Cornwell, I'm looking at you).

The People's Temple - San Francisco (image source)

The Hunter is the third book in the Wyatt Hunt series and Mr. Lescroart is hitting his stride with these characters. He's always been one of the most talented of the writers of crime fiction combined with courtroom drama and has always been one of my personal favorite writers so I tend to like everything he writes, but can also acknowledge ups and downs. The Hunter is one of the best books he's written lately. Great characters, complicated and interesting plot that weaves together the protagonist's attempt to understand what happened to his mother and some 35-40 years of other interconnected murders. Once he throws Jonestown into the mix he's off to the races with you right along with him.

San Francisco (image source)

I recently read A Thousand Lives by Julia Scheeres. Ms. Scheeres got access to all of the newly released documents on Jonestown and wrote a book that fundamentally changed my thinking about not just Jonestown, but about other similar gatherings of people of different kinds of faith. She elevated her subjects from the dregs of gullible ignorance to real breathing people with fundamental values and beliefs and hopes to make a better world. It was pretty breathtaking. It also gave me a look into how much The People's Temple was woven into the world of San Francisco and its politics during the brief part of the seventies before the trips to Guyana became permanent and the end became a forgone conclusion. Lescroart's inclusion of this bit of San Francisco history interlaced with the more expected crime fiction makes this book. As always Lescroart's San Francisco is real, palpable, and set within its rich historic context.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book and recommend it highly to fans of crime fiction. Read this. You won't be disappointed.

Publishing Information: Dutton Adult - January 3, 2012

Format: Kindle book

FTC Disclosure: E-galley received from publisher for review

Rating: ☆☆☆☆

Reading Challenges: Eclectic Reading Challenge 2012, Mount TBR Challenge, Mystery and Suspense Challenge

Book Review - Petrograd by Philip Gelatti, Art by Tyler Crook

2012-01-25T06:00:00.000-08:00

Synopsis: Introducing the untold tale of the international conspiracy behind the murder of Gregorii Rasputin! Set during the height of the first World War, the tale follows a reluctant British spy stationed in the heart of the Russian empire as he is handed the most difficult assignment of his career: orchestrate the death of the mad monk, the Tsarina's most trusted adviser and the surrogate ruler of the nation. The mission will take our hero from the slums of the working class into the opulent houses of the super rich... he'll have to negotiate dangerous ties with the secret police, navigate the halls of power, and come to terms with own revolutionary leanings, all while simply trying to survive!

Review: Petrograd is, as its synopsis so aptly puts it, a graphic novel about the plot to kill Rasputin. Set in WWI Russia, the tale is told through the eyes of an English spy, Cleary, who is caught between duty to country and his own shifting convictions.

Rasputin is a fascinating character, partly because Americans like to pretend they could never understand him - he must just be a Russian thing. Except, he's not. Rasputin plays his victims like any other grifter - giving them the false hope they need to move along and that he needs them to have so he can profit - in power and in riches (and both are important). He has a fascinating legend woven around him because he was seemingly impossible to kill - many attempts were made on his life and yet he always survived like some mysterious fakir floating above a bed of nails for centuries.

As I mentioned, Americans like to think that his appeal is inscrutable and locked into the uniqueness of the Russian psyche, the times, the context. I find this interesting because there are so very many examples of American Rasputins - their control and power may be different, but they've been able to hypnotize the nation over and over again. Don't believe me? Take a moment and ponder Huey P. Long, Pat Robertson, or any of the other grifters we've seen capture the nation throughout our history. Ultimately, it's not about the Russian psyche, but rather the human psyche, and this is beautifully illustrated in this book.

Panels from Petrograd

Petrograd examines the before, during, and after of Rasputin's murder and its ultimate impact on Russia's place in the world. The Romanov world of St. Petersburg begins to morph into Petrograd as Russians rise up to overthrow their monarchy and establish a new, if differently organized, one. The book successfully contrasts romanticism and reality - from the romanticism of a holy man in an ages long monarchy surrounded by beautiful things to the romanticism of a people's revolution to overthrow that monarchy and create a new world where everyone could have beautiful things. Reality, of course, is lots of death and this is even before Lenin comes back to impose his own views upon his new nation. There is the romanticism of freedom and the reality of governing. The romanticism of planning to kill an ultimate evil and the actual ugliness associated with it.

Well-written, grounded in historical research and primary documents. Petrograd takes a well-known story and re-tells it as if it were a spy thriller, but not a James Bond spy thriller - more a John le Carre spy thriller where everything is all cynicism and shades of gray. The art is gorgeous, rendered in sepia tones, although to be honest this bored me after awhile. I would've liked to see more color and more play between sepia-toned memory, gray reality, and the Faberge egg colors of Russian romanticism. All told a graphic novel worth reading - that the edition itself is also gorgeous is a bonus feature for a book I would've read had it been covered in cardboard and written in crayon.

Publishing Information: Oni Press - August 2011

FTC Disclosure: Copy received from the publisher for review

Rating: ☆☆☆☆

Reading Challenge: European Reading Challenge, Mount TBR Challenge, War Through the Generations Reading Challenge

Teaser Tuesdays

2012-01-24T06:00:00.000-08:00

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme hosted by Miz B of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

Grab your current read
Open to a random page
Share two (2) random teaser sentences from somewhere on that page
BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS (make sure that what you share doesn't give too much away! You don't want to ruin the book for others!)
Share the title and author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

Then I was off-balance, and the guy grabbed me around the waist. I screamed and kicked at him as hard as I could. Apparently he got tired of that, so he dropped me on the ground.

- Switched by Amanda Hocking

In My Mailbox Monday

2012-01-23T06:00:00.000-08:00

Troll? Mailbox in New Zealand (image source)

Dust to Dust by Benjamin Busch. Tim O’Brien meets Annie Dillard in this remarkable memoir by debut author Benjamin Busch. Much more than a war memoir, Dust to Dust brilliantly explores the passage through a lifetime—a moving meditation on life and death, the adventures of childhood and revelations of adulthood. Seemingly ordinary things take on a breathtaking radiance when examined by this decorated Marine officer—veteran of two combat tours in Iraq—actor on the hit HBO series The Wire, and son of acclaimed novelist Frederick Busch.

The Dispatcher by Ryan David Jahn. The phone rings. It's your daughter. She's been dead for four months. So begins East Texas police dispatcher Ian Hunt's fight to get his daughter back. The call is cut off by the man who snatched her from her bedroom seven years ago, and a basic description of the kidnapper is all Ian has to go on. What follows is a bullet-strewn cross-country chase from Texas to California along Interstate 10- a wild ride in a 1965 Mustang that passes through the outlaw territory of No Country for Old Men and is shot through with moments of macabre violence that call to mind the novels of Thomas Harris

The Lost Goddess by Tom Knox. In the silent caves beneath France, young archaeologist Julia Kerrigan unearths an ancient skull-with a hole bored through the forehead. After she reveals her discovery, her mentor is brutally murdered. Deep in the jungles of Southeast Asia, photographer Jake Thurby is offered a mysterious assignment by a beautiful Cambodian lawyer who is investigating finds at the two-thousand-year-old Plain of Jars-finds that shadowy forces want kept secret. From the temples of Angkor Wat and the wild streets of Bangkok to the prehistoric caves in Western Europe, what links Jake's and Julia's discoveries is a strange, demonic woman whose unquenchable thirst for vengeance-and the horrors she seeks to avenge- are truly shocking.

For the Kindle (advanced copies):

The Starboard Sea by Amber Dermott. Set against the backdrop of the 1987 stock market collapse, The Starboard Sea is an examination of the abuses of class privilege, the mutability of sexual desire, the thrill and risk of competitive sailing and the adult cost of teenage recklessness. It is a powerful and compelling novel about a young man navigating the depths of his emotional life, finding his moral center, trying to forgive himself, and accepting the gift of love

The Child Who by Simon Lelic. A chance phone call throws the biggest muder case in southern England into the hands of provincial attorney Leo Curtice. Twelve-year- old Daniel Blake stands accused of murdering an eleven-year-old girl. But who is truly responsible when one child kills another? As Curtice sets out to defend the indefensible, he soon finds himself pitted against an enraged community calling for blood. When the buildup of pressure takes a sinister turn, he fears for his wife and young daughter's safety. Must he choose between his family and the life of a damaged child? With piercing psychological insight, Lelic examines a community's response to a hideous crime.

The Flight of Gemma Hardy by Margot Livesey. Fate has not been kind to Gemma Hardy. Orphaned by the age of ten, neglected by a bitter and cruel aunt, sent to a boarding school where she is both servant and student, young Gemma seems destined for a life of hardship and loneliness. Yet her bright spirit burns strong. Fiercely intelligent, singularly determined, Gemma overcomes each challenge and setback, growing stronger and more certain of her path. Now an independent young woman with dreams of the future, she accepts a position as an au pair on the remote and beautiful Orkney Islands. But Gemma's biggest trial is about to begin . . . a journey of passion and betrayal, secrets and lies, redemption and discovery that will lead her to a life she's never dreamed.

A Detailed Man by David Swinson. Half of DC Police Detective Ezra Simeon’s face is immobilized from a persistent case of Bell’s Palsy—he must drink through a straw and eat carefully to avoid chewing through his own cheek. He has been detailed from robbery to the cold case department while he heals. “How odd to dream with one eye open, like having one foot in reality,” Sim muses in the dark, bluesy vein that is typical of his Chandler-esque narration. “That’s what makes dreaming dangerous and why I moved my gun farther from the bed.” Detective Simeon’s half-frozen world begins to heat up when a friend from his Academy days drops dead of a heart attack, and Sim is tapped to replace him, detailed now to homicide, where he inherits the high-profile case of a murdered escort he alone thinks may be the victim of a serial killer.

Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal by Jeanette Winterson. When Jeanette left home at sixteen because she was in love with a woman, Mrs. Winterson asked her: Why be happy when you could be normal? This is Jeanette's story--acute, fierce, celebratory--of a life's work to find happiness: a search for belonging, love, identity, a home. About a young girl locked out of her home, sitting on the doorstep all night, and a mother waiting for Armageddon with two sets of false teeth and a revolver in the duster drawer; about growing up in a northern industrial town; about the Universe as a Cosmic Dustbin. She thought she had written over the painful past until it returned to haunt her and sent her on a journey into madness and out again, in search of her biological mother. It is also about other people's stories, showing how fiction and poetry can form a string of guiding lights, a life raft that supports us when we are sinking.

For Kindle (bought by me for me):

The Hound of the Baskervilles by Arthur Conan Doyle. Perhaps the most popular of all Sherlock Holmes stories, The Hound of the Baskervilles combines the traditional detective tale with elements of horror. When Sir Charles Baskerville is found dead on the wild Devon moorland with the footprints of a giant hound nearby, the blame is placed on a family curse-and it is up to Holmes and Watson to solve the mystery of the legend. Rationalism is pitted against the supernatural and good against evil, as Sherlock Holmes tries to defeat a foe almost his equal.

The Vanishing Man by R. Austin Freeman. At the turn of the 20th century, Richard Austin Freeman (1862-1943) emerged as an author to be reckoned with in the world of detective fiction, introducing the highly memorable scientific detective Dr. Thorndyke, an early forensic sleuth. Armed with his little green case full of scientific detection aids, Thorndyke unravelled murders and mysteries using logic and material evidence

Whose Body? by Dorothy L. Sayers. Dorothy L. Sayers, long considered one of the top mystery authors of our day, has excelled herself in this delightfully macabre tale which centers around the disappearance of a wealthy financier and the discovery of a nude corpse, wearing a golden pince-nez, in a bathtub. Sayer's most renowned amateur detective, the engaging and amusing Lord Peter Wimsey, sets out to unravel this puzzling case under the jealous eye of Scotland Yard. Needless to say he succeeds in solving things to everyone's ultimate satisfaction, but only after a series of bloodcurdling and hair-raising episodes that will hold you spellbound with anticipation.

Let's Talk about Curry Goat

2012-01-22T10:51:00.000-08:00

Fremont Bridge Troll - Seattle, WA

At the moment I'm reading Switched by Amanda Hocking. Yes, these are reimagined trolls, but more about that when I review the book. In the meantime, my thinking about trolls goes like this: Trolls = Billy Goats Gruff = Curry Goat. Curry Goat is one of my very favorite Jamaican foods. It's thought to have originated in India and then spread throughout the Caribbean and then to America and Great Britain during the Caribbean diaspora. Goat is a red meat that is relatively low-fat and it's really really tasty.

It's easy for me to eat goat because when I was twelve and thirteen, I volunteered at the Memphis Zoo in Overton Park. One of the things we kid volunteers got to do was work the petting zoo. At the time it had bunnies and whatnot, but also some unusual animals like chinchillas and a baby camel. They also had a herd of goats. Guess what? Goats are mean. They're pushy, they head butt you, and /cranky on seems to be their permanent demeanour. I feel no deep-seated guilt at eating the cranky things plus they taste really good.

Here's a good recipe from FoodNetwork to get you started on your own Billy Goats Gruff adventure:

Curry Goat Yield: 6 servings

Ingredients

   2 pounds goat meat (or lamb) without bones
    1 lime, juiced
    1 tablespoon salt
    1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
    1 Scotch bonnet pepper (any color), seeded and minced
    1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
    1/2 teaspoon ground allspice (dry pimento berries)
    3 tablespoons curry powder
    2 whole scallions, sliced
    1 onion, sliced
    3 cloves garlic, minced
    1/4 cup vegetable oil
    3 tomatoes, diced
    1/2 cup coconut milk (optional)
    7 cups water

Directions

Rinse goat meat well, rub lime juice over it (from 1/2 whole lime), place meat in a bowl, then add salt, black pepper, Scotch bonnet, thyme, allspice, curry powder, scallions, onion and garlic. Leave to marinate for at least 2 hours in the refrigerator, longer would be ideal.

Heat the oil in a skillet until it is very hot, and saute the meat until golden brown. Then add the marinade, tomatoes and coconut milk, if using, and simmer for approximately 3 more minutes. Add water, reduce heat and allow to simmer for 2 to 3 hours stirring occasionally until meat is tender.

Weekend Cooking is open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share: Book (novel, nonfiction) reviews, cookbook reviews, movie reviews, recipes, random thoughts, gadgets, fabulous quotations, photographs. If your post is even vaguely foodie, feel free to grab the button and link up anytime over the weekend. Please link to your specific post, not your blog's home page. For more information, see the welcome post.

We Have Winners for Blueprints of the Afterlife by Ryan Boudinot

2012-01-22T09:41:00.000-08:00

Winners (image source)

I have once again consulted the randomness in the universe to come up with winners for my latest book giveaway. I am very happy to announce that the people listed below won a copy of Blueprints of the Afterlife by Ryan Boudinot. I really enjoyed this book on many levels and hope you all do, too.

Susan Schlesinger
Peter Fontaine
Jaque Richards
Denise Sachs
Christine Viscomi

Thanks to everyone who entered the giveaway. I wish I could give away a copy to everyone who entered, but then it wouldn't be a contest, right?

Wishing you a happy Sunday here in January 2012! Stay tuned for my next giveaway and, as always, happy reading!

Abandonment Issues

2012-01-21T08:59:00.000-08:00

Abandoned Russian Cannon

This is a semi-regular feature where I enter the confessional to tell you about the books I didn't finish. You knew that, right? You don't have to finish everything you start to read? You can decide a book just isn't for you and then not read it and nothing bad happens. Seriously. This was a big revelation for me, although I probably should've guessed the first time that I threw a Jane Austen novel against the wall and an army of Jane Austen fans didn't appear outside my dorm room with torches waiting to take me out of there for suitable, but polite, hanging. I didn't throw any of these against the wall, but here's what just hasn't worked for me lately:

Glock: The Rise of America's Gun by Paul M. Barrett. I often like this sort of thing, but for some reason this book didn't work for me. There was something vaguely dry and academic about the writing that didn't appeal - the musty scent of mothballs mixed with Great Great Aunt Twyla's lavendar sachets (poor thing, she never did find a husband).

Wayward Saints by Susie Roche. I have this thing where I want to read and like novels written by musicians about what it's like to have been really cool and then aged into oblivion or playing the bar at the Holiday Inn out by the highway. Somehow, this never works out for me.

The Winter Palace: A Novel of Catherine the Great by Eva Stachniak. Of Catherine the Great? Not so much. I really wanted to read about Catherine the Great, but that's only tangential to this novel. The "real" storyline with the spy just didn't work for me. So much intrigue seen at so much distance. The glory, the fashions, the jewelry, the hiding in the linen closet ... Just not for me.

That's it for now. Remember, this is just one persnickety reader's opinion. Your mileage may vary.

Guest Post - Ryan Boudinot on His Favorite Books from Childhood

2012-01-19T13:42:00.000-08:00

Ryan Boudinot

I loved science fiction as an adolescent but I tended to avoid canonical SF authors. I’ve never read anything by Isaac Asimov and only a couple books by Heinlein and Bradbury. A college roommate tried to turn me on to Philip K. Dick but it was only after I read Valis a couple years ago that I started enjoying his oeuvre. For as long as I can remember I’ve had this knee-jerk reaction against canonized books of any genre, owing to my equation of the status of “classic” with that which is officially sanctioned by authorities who seek to neuter books of transgressive material. I recognize this now for the straight-up snobbery that it is, but as a kid the time I steered clear of anything my teachers approved of.

Instead I lurked at the fringes of the sf genre, and no writer epitomizes this fringe to me more than Philip Jose Farmer. I fell hard for Farmer’s Riverworld series. It’s about a planet on which everyone who ever lived on earth is simultaneously resurrected on the banks of a river that stretches between the planet’s two poles. Over the course of the five novels, we meet such real-life historical characters as Samuel Clemmons, Hermann Göring, Tom Mix, Cyrano de Bergerac, and Jesus (though there are lots of guys walking around claiming to be Jesus, naturally). Nineteenth century British explorer Richard Burton plays a significant role in the series, as does a stand-in for Farmer himself, a science fiction writer named Peter Jarius Frigate. It’s up to these characters to figure out how the hell they all ended up on this strange planet and who is really calling the shots. At one point Clemmons builds a river boat. There are thrilling fights with rapiers, though if you die on Riverworld you’re just resurrected again somewhere else on the planet. Everyone carries around canisters called grails which, three times a day, they insert into mushroom-shaped kiosks in order to receive rations of food, marijuana, and other helpful supplies. Among the humans are aliens with multiple testicles who--

Cremaster Cycle

Okay, I’m going to pause it here. Describing the Riverworld series is a lot like describing Matthew Barney’s Cremaster Cycle. It just sounds so far-fetched in summary. An elevator pitch of the Riverworld novels might reasonably lead one to believe such a thing could never be artfully pulled off. No one would buy it (in both senses of the term). And yet Farmer somehow manages to craft a convincing world full of rollicking adventure and metaphysical questions. I remember reading a library copy of the third book, The Dark Design, in sixth grade and being completely out of my depth yet so engrossed and committed to seeing the book through. I finished the series while on vacation with my parents in Iowa City, where I recall enthusiastically summarizing the plot to my dad’s college roommate’s son, who just looked at me like I had lost my mind. Reading Riverworld I felt like I belonged to a secret society, a fellowship of blown minds.

I still think about the Riverworld series often. It sank down deep into my writing mulch and occasionally yields something useful for my own work. In my novel Blueprints of the Afterlife there’s something called a mystical refrigerator that offers forth an endless supply of food on a mesa in Arizona. I can trace this device back to the magical food-providing technology Farmer devised so that his characters wouldn’t starve or stay sober for too long. His novels were wonderful examples of how a writer can take the preposterous and make it seem real, and if I’m lucky enough to wake up on the banks of the river next to Philip Jose Farmer in the next life, I’ll be sure to thank him for writing them.

Book Review - Blueprints of the Afterlife by Ryan Boudinot

2012-01-18T06:00:00.000-08:00

Synopsis: It is the Afterlife. The end of the world is a distant, distorted memory called “the Age of Fucked Up Shit.” A sentient glacier has wiped out most of North America. Medical care is supplied by open-source nanotechnology, and human nervous systems can be hacked.

Abby Fogg is a film archivist with a niggling feeling that her life is not really her own. She may be right. Al Skinner is a former mercenary for the Boeing Army, who’s been dragging his war baggage behind him for nearly a century. Woo-jin Kan is a virtuoso dishwasher with the Hotel and Restaurant Management Olympics medals to prove it. Over them all hovers a mysterious man named Dirk Bickle, who sends all these characters to a full-scale replica of Manhattan under construction in Puget Sound. An ambitious novel that writes large the hopes and anxieties of our time—climate change, social strife, the depersonalization of the digital age—Blueprints of the Afterlife will establish Ryan Boudinot as an exceptional novelist of great daring.

First Line: The world was full of precious garbage.

Random Quote: Skinner took the cards out of his pocket and set them on the table. The other three regarded the cards with visible sadness as Skinner separated them into piles of innocuous memories and memories of war, the innocuous ones outnumbering the wartime ones three to one. Then, with the bottom of the pepper shaker, he smashed the war memories into pieces.

Review: Slipstream is a genre name coined by Bruce Sterling to describe a " ... kind of writing which simply makes you feel very strange; the way that living in the twentieth century makes you feel, if you are a person of a certain sensibility." This is work that fits somewhere in the interstices between literary fiction, science fiction, and fantasy. It is more like magical realism than any other genre, but it is its own thing. Slipstream contains elements of genre (like science fiction), but it isn't really about genre. It is more the celebration of the fantastical in the ordinary, the joy of playing the with the toys of any genre and putting them together in your very own way. Many writers are playing in this form, although they may seem unrelated. I would include China Mieville, but also Thomas Pynchon, Margaret Atwood, Isabelle Allende, and Gabrielle Garcia Marquez. There's Kathy Acker, certainly Jonathan Carroll, Don DeLillo. Also, there's Ryan Boudinot.

Slipstream Fiction (image source)

Blueprints of the Afterlife begins in the Age of Fucked Up Shit. It is post-apocalyptic and satirical, addressing many pieces of our current fucked up lives - overconsumption, lack of identity, and mysticism. What do we do after the apocalypse with all the junk left over? What do we privilege? Do we create or re-create? How do we begin to re-define ourselves and our humanity (or do we)?

Slipstream fiction makes you feel strange
(image source)

This is a complex and dense book, unfolding in small bites like a tasting menu. I thought of tasting menus developed in the world of molecular gastronomy (its very own interstice with interesting philosophical considerations), but also of the tasting menus of chef working at the top of their game incorporating classic techniques, fresh ingredients, and their own unique visions. Boudinot has written a long, 12-course tasting menu and like such a menu it can be confusing, overwhelming, scary, mysterious, and just plain delicious.

If you're feeling adventurous and don't mind ambiguity and middle spaces this is the book for you. Mr. Boudinot has a glorious uninhibited imagination and a deft hand for pacing and for drawing you into a story that will make you think about who we are, where we might be going, and the fantastical possibilities of what-if.

Format: Printed matter

Publishing Information: Black Cat/Grove Press - January 3, 2012

FTC Disclosure: Advance copy from the publisher for review

Rating: ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆

Reading Challenges: Eclectic Reading Challenge, Mount TBR Challenge

Teaser Tuesdays

2012-01-17T07:49:00.000-08:00

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme hosted by Miz B of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

Grab your current read
Open to a random page
Share two (2) random teaser sentences from somewhere on that page
BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS (make sure that what you share doesn't give too much away! You don't want to ruin the book for others!)
Share the title and author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

Was being black a problem? Not as much as some places, I guess, but if you paid real close attention, you might have noticed.

-- The Hunter by John Lescroart

Book Review - Wine to Water: A Bartender's Quest to Bring Clean Water to the World by Doc Hendley

2012-01-16T06:00:00.000-08:00

Synopsis: The captivating story of an ordinary bartender who's changing the world through clean water.

Doc Hendley never set out to be a hero. In 2004, Hendley-a small- town bartender- launched a series of wine-tasting events to raise funds for clean-water projects and to bring awareness to the world's freshwater crisis. He planned to donate the proceeds through traditional channels, but instead found himself traveling to one of the world's most dangerous hot spots: Darfur, Sudan.

There, Doc witnessed a government-sponsored genocide where the number-one weapon wasn't bullets-it was water. The Janjaweed terrorists had figured out that shooting up a bladder containing 10,000 liters of water, or dumping rotting corpses into a primary water source is remarkably efficient for the purposes of mass extermination. With limited funds, Doc realized that he couldn't build new wells costing $10,000 a pop, but he could hire local workers to restore a damaged well for a mere $50 each. He'd found his mission. Today, Doc and Wine to Water continue to help stricken peoples repair and maintain water- containment systems in places like Darfur, Cambodia, Uganda, and Haiti.

First Line: I'd driven this same road through the low desert plains of South Darfur dozens of times before.

Random Quote: During my assessment, I was also informed that the Janjaweed destroyed one of the major dams in the area over a year earlier. It had been one of the main sources for drinking water and much-needed irrigation. With that, I started thinking about what I could do to help rebuild the dam. I didn't know the first thing about cholera or fixing dams, but I figured it was just like back when I first started bartending in Raleigh: It's not so much about how good and fast you are at making a Fuzzy Navel; it's about developing a good relationship with the people sitting in front of you at the bar. Get that down first and then you can learn how to mix the complicated drinks - or fix a dam.

Review: Water is a paradoxical thing. It covers most of our planet. We are 99% water and we all need to survive - not just for drinking, but for irrigation and the maintenance of agriculture whether you're in an African village and gardening or running a major corporate farm. Water is something human beings have fought over throughout our history and the fight continues today. It has been a developer's tool (see also the history of Los Angeles) and a tool for organized genocide (see almost any war). And think of this, the rule of thumb for survival is 3 hours without shelter, 3 days without water, 3 weeks without food.

Doc repairing a well in Sudan

The paradox of water is that much of it is not potable. Water attracts all kinds of parasites and insects that carry quite deadly diseases - malaria, West Nile Virus, flu, cholera - the list goes on and on. Much of the world's water is so polluted with both chemical and bacterial waste and this water cannot be consumed without taking measures to make it potable. Some of it can never be consumed. Think of the Cuyahoga River - a river that caught fire so often that it prompted the development of clean water standards here in the U.S. Any time you think there's too much regulation think about our rivers on fire, rendered unsuitable for maintaining life at any level.

In the Third World the problem of getting potable water to people is an ongoing one. Here are some things to think about while you drink your Evian:

The water crisis claims more lives through disease than any war claims through guns.
At any given time, half the world's hospital beds are taken up by people suffering through water-related diseases
In Africa alone women and children spend 40 billion hours walking for water - time that could be used for education, agriculture - all the things needed to pull families out of poverty
In Darfur, the terrorizing violence between the black Africans and the Arab tribesmen, a genocide that killed over 100,000 civilians in one year was never a battle about religion - it was a struggle over land and water
In Cambodia, 74 percent of the country's deaths are directly related to the lack of clean water.

Wine to Water is a memoir about one young ordinary man's struggle to find himself and to become a part of enabling people get good drinking water and maintain their own wells and drinking water solutions so the access to water continues.

Doc in Uganda

Doc reminds me of a quote from Martin Luther King, Jr. about service:

Everybody can be great...because anybody can serve. You don't have to have a college degree to serve. You don't have to make your subject and verb agree to serve. You only need a heart full of grace. A soul generated by love.

This young man found himself and his calling. He also found that an individual can make a difference. To quote Mother Teresa, I alone cannot change the world, but I can cast a stone across the waters to create many ripples.” Doc Hendley has amply demonstrated that he too can create many ripples - as can we all.

A story of horror, hope, and empowerment, Water to Wine embodies the best of the journey to discovery - the part where you narrow down how you can use your unique gifts to better the lives of all. The gift may be ambitioius and dangerous or as simple as smiling at people - even when you don't know them. Not a perfect read, but an inspiring one.

Format: Printed matter

Publishing Information: Avery Publishing - January 12, 2012

FTC Disclosure: Advance copy from the publisher for the author's TLC Book Tour

Rating: ☆ ☆ ☆

Reading Challenges: Mount TBR Challenge, What's in a Name Challenge

I am pleased to be a part of Doc Hendley's virtual book tour through the blogosphere sponsored by TLC Book Tours.

proves how ordinary people can improve the world.

About Doc Hendley

Doc is the Founder and President of Wine To Water, a non-profit aid organization founded in 2007 focused on providing clean water to people in need around the world. Hendley was a top-10 finalist for CNN’s 2009 Hero of the Year and was featured on AC 360 with Anderson Cooper during the Haiti earthquake coverage as he was in Port-au-Prince providing and installing clean water filters for Haitian orphanages. He is an avid public speaker with many major speaking engagements lined up for the coming year.
Doc lives in Boone, NC with his wife and two children. Balancing family life and the demands of building Wine To Water, Doc Hendley continues to travel to underdeveloped, war-ridden nations, working in the field bringing clean water to those in need and also traveling and speaking around the country to raise awareness and advocacy for the worlds water crisis.
Connect with Doc on the Wine to Water website, winetowater.org, the Wine to Water Facebook page, and on Twitter @DocHendley or @winetowater.

Let's Talk about Cioppino

2012-01-15T06:00:00.000-08:00

Zoetrope Studios (formerly Columbus Tower/Sentinel Building)
North Beach neighborhood - San Francisco (image source)

Continuing on my mission to connect my food posts to what I'm reading now. I'm reading The Hunter by John Lescroart - set in San Francisco. Cioppino is the first thing I think about when I think of San Francisco. My Seattle grandmother made a gorgeous one.

Cioppino is an Italian fish stew originally popularized in America in the North Beach neighborhood of San Franciso (one of my favorite neighborhoods in the city). It has many commonalities with bouilabaisse (another gorgeous fish stew - French) and is knock your socks off delicious. The stew can made with any available local fresh seafood and shellfish - so a cioppino in San Francisco would be different than one made on the Gulf Coast, for instance.

My grandmother used James Beard's recipe so that's what I'll share with you. This one is simplified a bit from the one she used. That one can be found in James Beard's American Cookery. This is from Beard on Food:

Cioppino

Yield: 6-8 servings

Ingredients:
1 quart clams or mussels
1 cup red or white wine
½ cup olive oil
1 large onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 green pepper, chopped
4 ounces dried mushrooms, soaked in water till soft
4 tomatoes, peeled, seeded, and chopped
4 tablespoons tomato paste
2 cups red wine
Salt and pepper to taste
3 pounds sea bass, striped bass, or other firm-fleshed fish, cut into serving pieces
1 pound crabmeat
1 pound raw shrimp, shelled
3 tablespoons chopped parsley

Method:
In a large stockpot, steam the clams or mussels in one cup red or white wine until they open. Discard any that don’t, and remove the meat from the shells.

Set clams or mussels aside and strain wine broth through a fine cloth or mesh sieve and reserve. Heat olive oil in a large pot, and add onion, garlic, pepper, and mushrooms. Cook 3 minutes, then add tomatoes. Cook the mixture for four minutes. Add the reserved broth, tomato paste, and red wine. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Simmer for 20 minutes, and taste again for seasoning.

Add the sea bass. Cook just until done, then add the clams or mussels, crabmeat, and shrimp. Simmer just until the shrimp are cooked. Sprinkle with parsley and serve with crusty French or Italian bread.

There are many different versions of cioppino and once you know the basics, it's easy to cook and to create local variations. I remember best going out on Puget Sound with my granddaddy in his boat, setting crab pots and fishing through the day. Whatever we caught went into the cioppino my grandmother made for us and it was one of the best cappers to a gorgeous day.

Weekend Cooking is open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share: Book (novel, nonfiction) reviews, cookbook reviews, movie reviews, recipes, random thoughts, gadgets, fabulous quotations, photographs. If your post is even vaguely foodie, feel free to grab the button and link up anytime over the weekend. Please link to your specific post, not your blog's home page. For more information, see the welcome post.

Books for Charity

2012-01-14T15:15:00.000-08:00

As we all know, advance copies of books tend to pile up. Finished copies are easy to donate or to sell through your local used bookstore, but advance copies are different. Many places don't accept them and they are not for sale. I know that many people sell their copies, but for me that's not a choice that I feel good about.

I have given these books away in various settings, but most recently I have seen these copies in my local used bookstore and that makes me very uncomfortable. Still, there's the problem of these copies piling up and gathering dust and wanting new readers.

I decided to start a fundraising page at First Book. Here's what they say about themselves:

Learning to read is critical to a child’s success – both in school and in life. Literacy is one of the best predictors of a child’s future success. But a child without access to books won’t have the chance to become an engaged and capable reader.

This is the reality for children who are growing up in poverty; books are scarce.

80 percent of the pre-schools and after school programs serving children in need do not have a single book for the children they serve.

In some of the lowest-income neighborhoods in the country there is only one book available for every 300 children.

At First Book, our innovative approaches tackle the single biggest barrier to the development of literacy – access to books.

To date, First Book has provided more than 85 million books to children in need, increasing access to needed materials for educators and administrators, and helping to elevate educational opportunities for our nation’s most disadvantaged youth.

But that’s just the beginning – our successes, while impressive, have only reached a small fraction of the population in need in the United States. We have more work to do, more audiences to reach, more educators and administrators to empower, and ultimately more children who need books and quality educational opportunities – and we cannot do it alone.

We don’t want to fight illiteracy – we want to end it. By working together, we can and will create a generation of lifelong readers and achievers.

Here's how this will work. Donations may be of any amount, however, for each $5 an individual donates they will be able to choose a book from the list of available books. Donate $5, get one book; donate $10, get two, etc.

You will need to pay for postage, but shipping via MediaMail is very inexpensive, starting at $2.41 per pound. Since these are paperbacks the shipping should be cheap.

These ARC's are all over 6 months past their publication date. The list will be updated as I receive additional books and the 6 months time-frame has passed.

I will ask that you pay for shipping costs (which should be inexpensive as I use media mail).

Here's what to do:

Visit my fundraising page
Make a donation
If you've donated at least $5, take a look at the list of books you can choose and pick what you like
Send me an email at [chaotic compendiums at yahoo dot com] with your book choice(s) and your address and we'll go from there. All transactions for shipping will be done through PayPal.

I think this is a great way for all of us to help spread the love of reading!

Organizations and Recommended Reads about Human Trafficking

2012-01-12T06:00:00.000-08:00

Since the focus all week has been on A Walk Across the Sun by Corban Addison that specifically brings to the reader's attention the need for work being done in the area of human trafficking, I thought I'd give you all a list of organizations here in the US that are in this fight. In addition, I looked for the best books out there about human trafficking in case you want to read and learn more.

Organizations

HumanTrafficking.org - this page has a list of organizations working in this area in just about every state with links to their websites. If you want to help, these are places where can make a contribution.

Recommended Reads

10 Essential Human Trafficking Reads - this list contains both books and newspaper articles as well as various reports that will give you a better idea of the problem.

This is such an important area and I didn't want to leave you without places to go for further information.

I'm publishing some related links, as well:

Book Review - A Walk Across the Sun by Corban Addison

2012-01-11T06:00:00.000-08:00

Synopsis: Corban Addison leads readers on a chilling, eye-opening journey into Mumbai's seedy underworld--and the nightmare of two orphaned girls swept into the international sex trade. When a tsunami rages through their coastal town in India, 17-year-old Ahalya Ghai and her 15-year-old sister Sita are left orphaned and homeless. With almost everyone they know suddenly erased from the face of the earth, the girls set out for the convent where they attend school. They are abducted almost immediately and sold to a Mumbai brothel owner, beginning a hellish descent into the bowels of the sex trade. Halfway across the world, Washington, D.C., attorney Thomas Clarke faces his own personal and professional crisis-and makes the fateful decision to pursue a pro bono sabbatical working in India for an NGO that prosecutes the subcontinent's human traffickers. There, his conscience awakens as he sees firsthand the horrors of the trade in human flesh, and the corrupt judicial system that fosters it. Learning of the fate of Ahalya and Sita, Clarke makes it his personal mission to rescue them, setting the stage for a riveting showdown with an international network of ruthless criminals.

First Line: The sea was quiet at first light on the morning their world fell apart.

Random Quote: She spent the afternoon mopping and sweeping and scrubbing thick, oily grime off a multitude of surfaces in the kitchen. The woman was a cruel taskmaster; nothing Sita did was right. She rubbed so hard on the upper surface of the stove tha her fingers began to lose sensation. Her nails chipped on exposed edges, and the rags and scalding water burned her hands. By the time the restaurant opened at six that evening, she was bone-tired and famished. The woman banished Sita to the flat and gave her a broom and a dustpan.

Review: I wasn't entirely sure what to expect from A Walk Across the Sun and I'll admit that it was slow in the beginning and not really easy to get into. By page 70, however, I couldn't put it down. The plight of the many people, both adults and children, who are trafficked in various ways is appalling. In telling the story of two sisters, one who is raped in the brothel that they are sent to, the other sent to France and then America as a cleaning slave, Mr. Addison really illuminates all the various possibilities that happen.

The subplot involving an American attorney whose life is falling apart was also very good. It was especially interesting to watch as he began to discover that his life as an attorney destined for the federal bench (like his father) wasn't fulfilling. By traveling to India to work for a group trying to rescue and rehabilitate young girls from the brothels of Mumbai, he learns that fulfilling work is what it's all about. Through his involvement with the search to find Sita, the girl sent so many different places, enables him to see his life differently and to reconnect with his wife, Priya.

Surekha has spent much of her life in this four-by-six-foot (one-by-two-meter) brothel cell in Mumbai, India. She sleeps, prepares her meals, and stores her few possessions here—and this is where she serviced the customer who infected her with HIV. (image source)

Yes, the arc of the story is pretty improbable - the likelihood of finding one little girl across three continents is slim, but this is a story and it's good to have a happy ending sometimes.

I learned a lot from this book and it managed to tell me these stories without descending into utter darkness - yes, it's grim, but not so grim that its painful to read. Fast-paced once it gets started, filled with charming characters of all kinds (both good and bad) and all of their competing agendas, this is a read that kept me up nights. Recommended.

Publishing Information: Silver Oak - January 3, 2012

Format: Printed Matter

FTC Disclosure: Advance copy from the publisher for review

Reading Challenges: Eclectic Reading Challenge 2012, Mount TBR Challenge 2012, Mystery and Suspense Challenge

Rating: ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆

Teaser Tuesdays

2012-01-10T06:00:00.000-08:00

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme hosted by Miz B of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

Grab your current read
Open to a random page
Share two (2) random teaser sentences from somewhere on that page
BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS (make sure that what you share doesn't give too much away! You don't want to ruin the book for others!)
Share the title and author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

While the men negotiated, Ahalya stood in a state of near paralysis. In the harsh embrace of the stage lights, she felt transported. Her heart hammered in her chest, and she felt a prickly sensation begin at the base of her neck and wind its way downward.

- A Walk Across the Sun by Corban Addison

In My Mailbox Monday

2012-01-09T06:00:00.000-08:00

Mumbai Mailbox (image source)

In January, Mailbox Monday is hosted by Alyce at At Home with Books. In My Mailbox is hosted by The Story Siren. These are the places where we ~~brag about~~ share the books that arrived in our mailboxes each week. As always, I try to find a mailbox that is somehow associated with what I'm reading right now. I've been reading Lionheart by Sharon Kay Penman on my Kindle, but am also reading a printed book, A Walk Across the Sun by Corban Addison. It takes place in varied locations, but right now I'm reading about things happening in Mumbai, so that's where the mailbox is.

All my advance copies this week came to my Kindle - they're either from the publisher or via NetGalley:

A Greyhound of a Girl by Roddy Doyle. Mary O’Hara is a sharp and cheeky 12-year-old Dublin schoolgirl who is bravely facing the fact that her beloved Granny is dying. But Granny can’t let go of life, and when a mysterious young woman turns up in Mary’s street with a message for her Granny, Mary gets pulled into an unlikely adventure. The woman is the ghost of Granny’s own mother, who has come to help her daughter say good-bye to her loved ones and guide her safely out of this world. She needs the help of Mary and her mother, Scarlett, who embark on a road trip to the past. Four generations of women travel on a midnight car journey. One of them is dead, one of them is dying, one of them is driving, and one of them is just starting out.

Hit Lit: Cracking the Code of the Twentieth Century's Biggest Bestsellers by James W. Hall. What do Michael Corleone, Jack Ryan, and Scout Finch have in common? Creative writing professor and thriller writer James W. Hall knows, and now, in this fun, witty, and thought-provoking book, he reveals how bestsellers work. Using twelve of the biggest bestselling novels of the twentieth century as case studies—including The Godfather, Gone with the Wind, To Kill a Mockingbird, and Jaws—Hall offers a fascinating discussion of some of the common features of popular literature.

Enchantments by Kathryn Harrison. St. Petersburg, 1917. After Rasputin’s body is pulled from the icy waters of the Neva River, his eighteen-year-old daughter, Masha, is sent to live at the imperial palace with Tsar Nikolay and his family—including the headstrong Prince Alyosha. Desperately hoping that Masha has inherited Rasputin’s miraculous healing powers, Tsarina Alexandra asks her to tend to Aloysha, who suffers from hemophilia, a blood disease that keeps the boy confined to his sickbed, lest a simple scrape or bump prove fatal. Two months after Masha arrives at the palace, the tsar is forced to abdicate, and Bolsheviks place the royal family under house arrest. As Russia descends into civil war, Masha and Alyosha grieve the loss of their former lives, finding solace in each other’s company.

The Hunter by James Lescroart. Raised by loving adoptive parents, San Francisco private investigator Wyatt Hunt never had an interest in finding his birth family-until he gets a chilling text message from an unknown number: "How did ur mother die?" The answer is murder, and urged on by curiosity and the mysterious texter, Hunt takes on a case he never knew existed, one that has lain unsolved for decades. His family's dark past unfurls in dead ends. Child Protective Services, who suspected but could never prove that Hunt was being neglected, is uninformed; his birth father, twice tried but never convicted of the murder, is in hiding; Evie, his mother's drug-addicted religious fanatic of a friend, is untraceable. And who is the texter, and how are they connected to Hunt?

Poison Flower by Thomas Perry. Poison Flower, the seventh novel in Thomas Perry’s celebrated Jane Whitefield series, opens as Jane spirits James Shelby, a man unjustly convicted of his wife’s murder, out of the heavily guarded criminal court building in downtown Los Angeles. But the price of Shelby’s freedom is high. Within minutes, men posing as police officers kidnap Jane and, when she tries to escape, shoot her. Jane’s captors are employees of the man who really killed Shelby’s wife. He believes he won’t be safe until Shelby is dead, and his men will do anything to force Jane to reveal Shelby’s hiding place. But Jane endures their torment, and is willing to die rather than betray Shelby. Jane manages to escape but she is alone, wounded, thousands of miles from home with no money and no identification, hunted by the police as well as her captors. She must rejoin Shelby, reach his sister before the hunters do, and get them both to safety.

Plus I pre-ordered the next book in the House Wars series and it came early. Yes, I ordered it for the Kindle. I'll probably by the hardback later for my collection, but this is a big tome and I didn't want to lug it around. This is, actually, what e-books are for - saving your wrists:

Skirmish by Michelle Sagara West. At long last, Jewel is preparing to announce her candidacy to become the next Terafin and claim the House Seat. But it is a decision that has her targeted by demons who will stop at nothing to destroy Jewel and her allies as the House War begins...

Let's Talk about Country Captain

2012-01-08T12:00:00.000-08:00

I've sort of meandered about with my recent bout of food writing, covering things that were in season or were from my childhood, or related to a holiday. I love food and come from a long line of ridiculously obsessed foodies on both sides of my family. My father always used to say that we were either eating or talking about what we were going to eat next. That pretty much describes all of us. Many of us are amazing cooks in various ways. We've got some great bakers, too. Still, the primary focus of chaotic compendiums is books and reading. So I thought I'd start the new year with connecting food posts to what I'm reading now (much in the same way that I hunt for a mailbox from the place I'm reading about each week for In My Mailbox Monday.

Mumbai

I'm reading A Walk Across the Sun by Corban Addison. Some of the book is set in various parts of India, particularly Mumbai. Other parts are set in the US in the DC area and its environs. This combination made me think of an old Southern dish called Country Captain. Its origins are a bit uncertain, but I suspect that it was an adaption of Indian food that British sea captains trading in spice brought to America via their trading. The first known recorded recipe came from Philadelphia, but Low Country cooks made it their own. As much as anywhere, traditional Southern food comes from and is influenced by a lot of different cuisines and this is just one example.

Charleston, SC (image source)

This isn't a traditional curry, but its flavors and ingredients are skewed towards Indian spice. It has been a staple of Junior League lunches and on country club menus all over the South, particularly in Charleston. The Joy of Cooking has a good version, but my favorite comes from Scott Peacock, who wrote an amazing book on Southern cooking along with Edna Lewis, The Gift of Southern Cooking: Recipes and Revelations from Two Great American Cooks. This is an excellent read as well as being a great gateway into the complexities of Southern cooking.

Mr. Peacock cooked for years at Watershed Restaurant when it was located in Decataur, GA and I had the pleasure of eating there a number of times. The food was always delicious. I read that he had left the restaurant which seems to be reopening in a different location in Atlanta itself. I'm glad I got the chance to eat his food. It created amazing memories.

Without further blathering, here is Mr. Peacock's recipe for Country Captain. If you cook this, you won't be disaapointed.

Country Captain

Ingredients

4 chicken thighs or legs, skin removed
2 teaspoons dried thyme
Kosher salt
freshly ground pepper
2 tablespoons canola oil
4 to 5 slices of thick bacon
4 to 6 cloves garlic, chopped
3 ribs celery, chopped
1 large yellow onion, chopped
1 14-ounce can chopped tomatoes
2 tablespoons curry powder
1 1/2 tablespoons unsalted butter
1/3 cup dried currants or raisins
2 bay leaves
2 cups steamed basmati rice

Instructions

Dry chicken well, then season liberally with thyme, salt, and freshly ground pepper. Pat spices firmly into the chicken so they will stay during cooking. Heat a large Dutch oven until very hot, then add oil. When the oil is barely smoking, add chicken and brown well on both sides, about 12 minutes. Remove chicken and set aside.

Add bacon to Dutch oven, cook until crispy, then remove. Drain bacon on paper towels. Chop bacon into 1/2-inch pieces and set aside.

Remove excess bacon oil from Dutch oven, leaving just enough to saute vegetables. Add garlic, celery, and onion to Dutch oven and cook until tender, about 10 minutes. Add tomatoes along with their juice, and stir frequently until the mixture thickens. Stir in curry powder, butter, currants, and bay leaves. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Reduce heat, cover, and simmer, stirring occasionally, until the mixture thickens into a chunky ragu, about 30 minutes.

Heat oven to 325°F. In the Dutch oven, bury the chicken and bacon pieces in the sauce. Cover, and cook in the oven until the chicken is falling off the bone, about 1 hour 15 minutes.
Remove from oven, plate the chicken alongside the rice, and spoon all remaining sauce over the chicken.

Enjoy this! You can use any kind of curry powder that you like from the spice rack or one that you develop on your own. If you do the latter, don't forget to toast the spices before grinding - that's what really brings out their flavor.

Happy New Year to all you foodies and readers out there. Don't forget to visit Beth Fish Reads for more posts about food. You won't be sorry.

We Have a Winner!

2012-01-08T11:00:00.000-08:00

I was very happy to be able to give away a copy of The Western Lit Survival Kit! Thanks to the publishers and to TLC Book Tours who made this possible. I enjoyed the book and I get to pass it along to someone else! Gotta love sharing reading.

I put the entries in a hat (a vintage silk top hat), had my personal companion stir it about, and charged the butler with picking a winner from the hat. Okay, actually I used a spreadsheet and Random.org, but the result is a winner and the first description is much more fun.

The winner is: Mikey Hauk!

Thanks to everyone who entered. Stay tuned - many more giveaways to come this year.

My Blog Got a Makeover!

2012-01-07T06:00:00.000-08:00


Rosalind Russell in Makeover Mode from The Women (1939) (image source)

I've been sort of dissatisfied with a number of things about the look and feel of my blog and have thought quite a bit about what I wanted to do about it. I seriously considered migrating to a self-hosted WordPress solution, but I didn't want to spend the extra money. Instead I decided to give myself a facelift - rearranging things, giving myself more room for my actual content, designed a new header (that made me very happy), and installed Disqus, a commenting solution for Blogger that allows for things like replying to comments.

I'm pretty happy with how things turned out and very happy that I'll be able to reply to your comments directly. Look for a bunch more interaction from me now that I can do it properly!

New year, new look. Plus it satisfied my desire for a total personal makeover. Now I can just go get a haircut instead.

Give Away Books on World Book Night - April 23, 2012

2012-01-06T20:03:00.000-08:00

A big thank you to Trish from Hey Lady! Whatcha Reading? She posted about this and signing up was a no brainer. Here are the basics:

We need 50,000 book-loving volunteers to fan out across America on April 23, 2012! Just take 20 free copies of a book to a location in your community, and you just might change someone’s life.

The goal is to give books to new readers, to encourage reading, to share your passion for a great book. The entire publishing, bookstore, library, author, printing, and paper community is behind this effort with donated services and time. And with a million free World Book Night paperbacks!

The first World Book Night was held in the UK last year, and it was such a big success that it’s spreading around the world! Please volunteer to be a book giver in the U.S. Sign up now to be a book giver. Read more about World Book Night on this site, from the free book list to the FAQs. Thank you!

As Trish said, this is a no-brainer for all of us who blog about books since by our very nature we are evangelists for reading!

You don't have to give the books away only at night. I plan to give books away during the course of my day since I move through many places with lots of people of all ages. What a great way to spread the love of books throughout the community.

Book Review - Gun Games by Faye Kellerman

2012-01-06T06:00:00.000-08:00

Synopsis: LAPD lieutenant detective Decker and his wife, Rina, have willingly welcomed fifteen-year-old Gabriel Whitman, the son of a troubled former friend, into their home. While the enigmatic teen seems to be adapting easily, Decker knows only too well the secrets adolescents keep—witnessed by the tragic suicide of another teen, Gregory Hesse, a student at Bell and Wakefield, one of the city’s most exclusive prep schools.

Gregory’s mother, Wendy, refuses to believe her son shot himself and convinces Decker to look deeper. What he finds disturbs him. The gun used in the tragedy was stolen—evidence that propels him to launch a full investigation with his trusted team, Sergeant Marge Dunn and Detective Scott Oliver. But the case becomes darkly complicated by the suicide of another Bell and Wakefield student—a death that leads them to uncover an especially nasty group of rich and privileged students with a predilection for guns and violence. Decker thought he understood kids, yet the closer he and his team get to the truth, the clearer it becomes that he knows very little about them, including his own charge, Gabe. The son of a gangster and an absent parent, the boy has had a life filled with too much free time, too many unexplained absences, and too little adult supervision.

Before it’s over, the case and all its terrifying ramifications will take Decker and his detectives down a dark alley of twisted allegiances and unholy alliances, culminating at a heart-stopping point of no return.

First Line: It was bad news walking through the door.

Random Quote: From a detective's standpoint, suicide was a strange crime. There was a victim, but the perpetrator wore many faces: depression, psychosis, humiliation, overwhelming debt, rage, self-loathing or that tragic combination of teenage angst paired with a firearm.

Review: I admire the stamina of authors like Ms. Kellerman who can sustain a series across twenty books. Gun Games is indeed the twentieth book in Ms. Kellerman's Peter Decker/Rina Lazarus series and it's a good one. As with all long-running series some books are better than others and there is often a point where everything lags or is slashed and burned (I'm looking at you Patricia Cornwell and Laurell K. Hamilton). To be honest the last few books in this series have been okay, but just okay and I'm accustomed to these books being much better than okay so I've worried a bit that she might be running out of steam. Gun Games proves that there's a lot more life left in the series.

Kellerman writes what I suppose you would call police procedurals, but there are many things about her books that make her series so appealing. It's nice to see a police officer in a stable marriage with a huge sprawling religion and a faith (Judaism) that defines so much of how they live. Peter Decker's a good cop and a good family man - definitely not par for the course in the way we tend to think of cops. Rina Lazarus provides a nice grounding point - smart, sensible, intuitive, and a great cook. Best of all, theirs is not a perfect marriage or family - they have ups and downs just like the rest of us.

LA at night with its glamour on (image source)

Gun Games focuses on a duo of prep school suicides that may or may not be actual suicides. Interlaced throughout the story is Gabriel Donatti, the Decker's foster kid - a piano prodigy and the son of a mob boss. Kellerman brings out the intoxicating moment of first love and even more accurately the decision that young, talented players in the classical world must make - play and perform or don't. It's hard to give up a life at 15 on your way to start attending Julliard at 16. Even when music is your world, everyone knows how much they'll have to sacrifice - scary decisions at young ages. Kellerman brings the two stories full circle in a lovely bit of plotting.

I thoroughly enjoyed Gun Games as a great thrill ride and absolutely perfect mind candy. Highly recommended for anyone who likes crime fiction and needs a good escape.

Publishing Information: William Morrow - January 3, 2010

FTC Disclosure: Advance copy from the publisher for review

Rating: Blue

Book Review - A Red Herring Without Mustard by Alan Bradley

2012-01-04T06:00:00.000-08:00

Synopsis: Award-winning author Alan Bradley returns with another beguiling novel starring the insidiously clever and unflappable eleven-year-old sleuth Flavia de Luce. The precocious chemist with a passion for poisons uncovers a fresh slew of misdeeds in the hamlet of Bishop’s Lacey—mysteries involving a missing tot, a fortune-teller, and a corpse in Flavia’s own backyard.

Flavia had asked the old Gypsy woman to tell her fortune, but never expected to stumble across the poor soul, bludgeoned in the wee hours in her own caravan. Was this an act of retribution by those convinced that the soothsayer had abducted a local child years ago? Certainly Flavia understands the bliss of settling scores; revenge is a delightful pastime when one has two odious older sisters. But how could this crime be connected to the missing baby? Had it something to do with the weird sect who met at the river to practice their secret rites? While still pondering the possibilities, Flavia stumbles upon another corpse—that of a notorious layabout who had been caught prowling about the de Luce’s drawing room.

Pedaling Gladys, her faithful bicycle, across the countryside in search of clues to both crimes, Flavia uncovers some odd new twists. Most intriguing is her introduction to an elegant artist with a very special object in her possession—a portrait that sheds light on the biggest mystery of all: Who is Flavia?

As the red herrings pile up, Flavia must sort through clues fishy and foul to untangle dark deeds and dangerous secrets.

First Line: "You frighten me," the Gypsy said.

Random Quote: He knocked his rib cage with a clenched fist and forced a cough that, since I had done it so often myself, didn't fool me for an instant. Neither did his fake gamekeeper dialect.

Review: I love Flavia de Luce and Alan Bradley for creating her (and for having great titles). I think the primary thing I like about her is how very much she reminds me of Harriet the Spy, one of my all-time favorite characters as a kid and a book I read over and over again. Throw Harriet down in 1950'sish Britain and she'd be Flavia de Luce.

The other thing I like about this look is the way Mr. Bradley takes a fairly typical British mystery setting/theme and plays with it in lots of fun ways. Putting a precocious eleven year old in the midst of the mayhem is brilliant.

Gypsy Caravans - Date Unknown (image source)

A Red Herring Without Mustard is the third in the series and I liked it much more than the second. The plot involving gypsies and mysteries involving old legends, religious cults, and chicanery of all kinds just really pleased me. I have loved stories about gypsies and gypsy caravans since the first time I read The Wind in the Willows and Mr. Toad bought a gypsy caravan (to hilarious purpose). Putting traveling people still roaming about the countryside in caravans is irresistible.

There are plenty of twists and turns throughout to keep the reader reading and amused. The reminders of my own childhood reading world and the eensiest touch of Agatha Christie combine to create a delightful experience!

Publishing Information: Delacorte Press - February 8, 2011

FTC Disclosure: Borrowed in e-book format from the Berkeley Public Library (one of the best places in the universe)

Rating: Blue

Reading Challenges: This was completed in late December 2011 so counts towards none of these.

Book Review - The Western Lit Survival Kitby Sandra Newman

2012-01-03T06:00:00.000-08:00

Synopsis: A side-splitting tour that makes it a blast to read the Western literary canon, from the ancient Greeks to the Modernists.

To many, the Great Books evoke angst: the complicated Renaissance dramas we bluffed our way through in college, the dusty Everyman’s Library editions that look classy on the shelf but make us feel guilty because they’ve never been opened. On a mission to restore the West’s great works to their rightful place (they were intended to be entertaining!), Sandra Newman has produced a reading guide like no other. Beginning with Greek and Roman literature, she takes readers through hilarious detours and captivating historical tidbits on the road to Modernism. Along the way, we find parallels between Rabelais and South Park, Jane Austen and Sex and the City, Jonathan Swift and Jon Stewart, uncovering the original humor and riskiness that propelled great authors to celebrity.

Packed with pop culture gems, stories of literary hoaxes, ironic day jobs for authors, bad reviews of books that would later become classics, and more.

First Line: In the 1920s, educators like Mortimer Adler started the Great Books programs, while imprints like Everyman's Library made the classics available to everyone at reasonable prices.

Random Quote: No matter what you say, Shakespeare is the greatest writer who ever lived. There's no point fighting it. Centuries of reading, argument, and discussion have gone into this conclusion. Today, if you deny Shakespeare's genius, yours is a tiny flea voice struggling to be heard over a shouting throng of people who don't care.

Review: I've always had a nebulous connection to the world of classics as taught by our fine educational systems. Throughout school I found that more often than not I had already read whatever we were going to read in class and had often read some relevant literary criticism. This is because I am a book nerd and I always have been.

I went to college with the notion of majoring in English (that's what book nerds do, right?), but after my first few classes I knew that wasn't the direction I wanted to go. The sad fact is that many (not all) programs in Literature are full of people who don't really like to read all that much. Instead, the sport is clubbing to death anything "classic" that you might ever have had fun with like a baby seal. Seriously, English departments are littered with these sad little corpses.

I've never read classic literature because I had to (although sometimes it has been a requirement). I read it because I like to - good stories, good writing, a chance to have great discussion with the larger world of readers - what's not to like? It's almost always been fun (and when it wasn't, I didn't finish it). I've had the opportunity to read many things written in other times and styles and to be transported and brain-stimulated by them.

James Joyce, photo by Bernice Abbot (image source)

In some cases you get to add in the macho factor (come on, you all know we all have it) - saying that you've read about Ulysses (both Homer and James Joyce; plus the Steely Dan song, Home at Last from Aja - for extra credit) gives you a certain level of credibility. If you've read these things and can have an intelligent discussion about it then you are The Man (or The Woman, if you prefer). Enjoy all that and you're probably a book nerd and that is fine thing to be.

The Western Lit Survival Kit: An Irrational Guide to the Classics, from Homer to Faulkner is a fun, factual, and irreverent look at some of the major authors in classic literature. In my head it's called the Lit Wit Kit. It's a great book for dipping into to pick your next classic read (all those people out there gearing up for classics reading challenges want this book) or to find the author's assessments with which you disagree (also great fun). When you disagree you get to yell at the book and that's another sport that I highly recommend.

Illustration by Charles Vess
(image source)

I mean, just look at the quote above. Of course Shakespeare is the best thing since sliced bread for all the reasons suggested, but the author forgot one. It's not just that he's been read, discussed, and argued about. It's also because his plays have been produced on stage (and in film) pretty much continuously. This component of the evaluation of his writing is a huge part of what drives our overall view of him and I think it's important to remember that. His work is timeless, flexible, and remains relevant and those things make him our lovely Bill who cradles us in his arms and takes us on the ride of our life.

I love the author's rating system of Importance, Difficulty, and Fun. If you're intimidated by an author, pick something high on the fun level and low on the difficulty level and it'll get you started on their works. Some authors you will never ever like (I hate Jane Austen, for instance), some books you will never ever get through (I can't read Moby Dick), but you'll like lots and will read more and your universe will continue to expand.

I have this next to my bed and continue to peruse, look things up, and think about what I'm reading. I expect I'll continue to do so. One criticism of the book is the lack of an index (this makes me bang my head on my desk), but this may be remedied in the actual published version that releases today. My other criticism is that the author cannot seem to contain her snarkiness. Many times she crosses the line between witty and humorous and the world of mean and I am so much better than you. This isn't hard to ignore, but it is there.

A fun read with plenty of food for thought and no seal clubbing. Thank you, Ms. Newman!

Publishing Information: Published by Gotham Books/Penguin, released January 3, 2012.

FTC Disclosure: Advance copy through TLC Book Tours and the publisher

Rating: Blue

About Sandra Newman

Sandra Newman is the author of the novels Cake and The Only Good Thing Anyone Has Ever Done, and a memoir, Changeling. She is the co-author of How Not to Write a Novel and Read This Next. Newman lives in Brooklyn, New York.

Don't forget to visit the other stops on Ms. Newman's tour for additional opinions and chances to win a copy of the book:

Monday, January 2nd: Sophisticated Dorkiness
Tuesday, January 3rd: Chaotic Compendiums
Wednesday, January 4th: DBC Reads
Thursday, January 5th: Book Hooked Blog
Friday, January 6th: Bibliophiliac
Monday, January 9th: Bibliosue
Tuesday, January 10th: Unabridged Chick
Wednesday, January 11th: The 3 R’s Blog
Thursday, January 12th: Library of Clean Reads
Friday, January 13th: Books Distilled
Monday, January 16th: Lit and Life
Tuesday, January 17th: Shooting Stars Mag
Wednesday, January 18th: Luxury Reading
Thursday, January 19th: Joyfully Retired
Friday, January 20th: Book Snob
Monday, January 23rd: Ted Lehmann’s Bluegrass, Books, and Brainstorms
Tuesday, January 24th: Sarah Reads Too Much
Wednesday, January 25th: Literary Musings
Thursday, January 26th: Between the Covers

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