Reading Undeterred

Midnight Plan of the Repo Man by W. Bruce Cameron (2014)

noreply@blogger.com (Carlie) — Mon, 23 Sep 2019 20:24:00 +0000

Finished: September 22, 2019

(Fiction - PS3603.A4535; 813/.6)

Narrator Ruddy McCann is a repo man with a murky past who has a vivid dream about a murder. Days later, a voice appears in his head and turns out to be the murder victim, Alan Lottner. Ruddy and Alan, after a bit of getting used to each other, figure out who killed Alan. The hard part is convincing the police to investigate without revealing how Ruddy knows.

There is a fun cast of side characters. Becky is Ruddy’s sister, who runs their family-owned bar. Jimmy Growe, handsome but not bright, keeps cashing bad checks mysteriously being sent to him. Katie Lottner, Alan’s daughter and Ruddy’s love interest. Kermit, Becky’s boyfriend, who is always scheming. There are more quirky characters that help round out the story.

In the end, Ruddy must take matters into his own hands to save Katie and himself. Luckily he has a plan.

The Story of Beautiful Girl by Rachel Simon (2011)

noreply@blogger.com (Carlie) — Fri, 09 Aug 2019 17:17:00 +0000

Finished: August 7, 2019

(Fiction - PS3569.I4845; 813/.54)

Lynnie had lived in an institution since she was a young girl when she ran away with her deaf boyfriend, Homan. Lynnie had been raped by one of the guards and was pregnant. She was petrified of having her child grow up in a place like “the school.” When Lynnie, Homan, and the baby appeared on the doorstep of an older woman named Martha, they were scared and running for their lives.

Just as fast as these characters’ stories merged, they were separated again. The rest of the novel concerns them trying to get back together again. Lynnie was captured and taken back to the school, Homan ran off into the woods and was presumed dead, Martha and the baby were left unexpectedly together.

Lynnie grew older in the institution which was eventually shut down. She was reunited with her sister and fought for self-determination. Homan travelled all over the country, living in various places with various people, trying to get back to Lynnie but not really sure how. Martha also travelled from place to place to hide the baby from authorities.

Most of the novel is quite sad and filled with tragedy, especially for Lynnie. She does find a sort of peace and happiness, but longed for Homan and her baby. In the end, the story wraps up sweetly with just a hint of ambiguity to keep it interesting.

Mr. Chartwell by Rebecca Hunt (2010)

noreply@blogger.com (Carlie) — Mon, 01 Jul 2019 16:58:00 +0000

Finished: June 29, 2019

(Fiction - PR6108.U585 M7; 823/.92)

Esther Hammerhans lives a mild life although lonely since her husband, Michael, died. When she opens her house to a lodger, she gets someone she did not expect. Her lodger is a large black dog, known as Black Pat, who not only speaks to her, but also runs roughshod through her life. Through conversations with Black Pat, she learns that this dog is on assignment and his client is Winston Churchill.

Winston Churchill is about to retire from office in a few days. With this, a dreaded companion throughout his life has re-emerged. Black Pat is back to wreak havoc on his psyche. The dog wanders in and out to cause sorrow and angst.

When Esther and Winston meet, they find that they are the only ones who can see this awful animal. Winston implores Esther to fight the dog because this is a war. She realizes what a drag Black Pat has been on her mind and takes his advice to fight back.

Black Pat is the embodiment of depression. This depression has haunted Winston and Michael their whole lives. It even drove Michael to take his own life. Now it is stalking Esther. Armed with good friends and resilience, Esther refuses to be taken down.

Inferior: How Science Got Women Wrong – and the New Research That’s Rewriting the Story by Angela Saini (2017)

noreply@blogger.com (Carlie) — Wed, 12 Jun 2019 23:06:00 +0000

Finished: June 7, 2019

(Nonfiction - HQ1180; 305.4)

Most scientific writings and research for many centuries has viewed females as biologically inferior in multiple areas. Not only are they viewed as the weaker sex physically, but they are also viewed as less cognitively able, prone to over-emotion, and lacking in mathematical abilities among other things. They are biologically well-suited to caring for households and the young, though.

Saini looks back at hundreds of years of research on sex and gender as well as current research findings. She finds that almost if not all of the research claiming women having natural shortcomings was done by men who failed to understand women and their biology. Beyond scientific negligence, bias among men aided incomplete and inaccurate findings.

Scientific debates continue to this day. While much has been done to mitigate scientific bias, it still occurs regularly. Research that confirms stereotypes and that matches societal expectations of sex and gender get more attention in the media, especially if conducted by a male. As a whole, the science is improving but much remains to be corrected.

Why They Do It: Inside the Mind of the White-Collar Criminal by Eugene Soltes (2016)

noreply@blogger.com (Carlie) — Fri, 17 May 2019 22:57:00 +0000

Finished: May 12, 2019

(Nonfiction - HV6768 .S65; 364.16/8)

Eugene Soltes is a business school professor who set out to investigate why white-collar criminals would risk everything they had worked for to commit crimes that at times did not even have a very big payoff. He decided to write to currently imprisoned white-collar criminals to ask them why they did it.

The book begins with very interesting background information about what white-collar crime is and how certain acts of business began to be regarded as crimes at all. Not until the stock market crash of 1929 did people more widely begin seeing business practices as harmful to society. Part of the reason this took so long is that the harm is hard to distinguish and the victims often remain unseen.

These elements also affect how the business people themselves view their actions. Many of the prisoners Soltes interviewed still did not see the harm in their actions. Another aspect involves the ease with which they were able to commit these crimes. They are often all on paper, and unlike violent acts, it can feel like they have done nothing wrong. Some even believe they are doing the right thing by being devious.

The author concludes that a number of factors contribute to white-collar crime. First is the need for others in the organization to question corrupt practices. A related factor is seeking disagreement, and the best judge of appropriateness often comes from those outside of the organization. When people’s beliefs are questioned, and they are confronted with another viewpoint, they often see the error of their ways. Another factor is ineffectual compliance and enforcement. The methods we use to deter crime are not often effective and the criminal is too far removed from the consequences to change their behaviors.

Overcomplicated: Technology at the Limits of Comprehension by Samuel Arbesman (2016)

noreply@blogger.com (Carlie) — Mon, 15 Apr 2019 21:03:00 +0000

Finished: April 9, 2019

(Nonfiction - T14.5 .A69; 303.483)

I found this short book a refreshing take on technology and its impact on our lives. It was neither doomsday scenario nor rose-colored glasses in perspective. The author posits that we are now at a point in technological development that makes knowing exactly how everything works impossible. Even those who create the code and build the machines know everything about how it all works.

He takes what feels to me to be a very Zen approach to technology. It is not possible to create software without bugs and sometimes the bugs are built-in. You could debug it, but it might bring the entire system crashing down. We also don’t have to know everything in detail and a generalist approach would be more beneficial. We should know a little bit about a lot of things so we can see how the systems fit together.

In the final chapter, the author invites the reader to walk humbly with technology. Perhaps there is no way to know everything and that is okay, even a preferable approach. He states “…we must work to maintain two opposing states: mystery without wonder and wonder without mystery. The first requires that we strive to eliminate our ignorance, rather than simply reveling in it. And the second means that once we understand something, we do not take it for granted” (p. 173).

Three Squares: The Invention of the American Meal by Abigail Carroll (2013)

noreply@blogger.com (Carlie) — Tue, 09 Apr 2019 21:01:00 +0000

Finished: April 6, 2019

(Nonfiction - GT2853.U5 C38; 394.1/20973)

It may seem like the idea of three meals a day – breakfast, lunch, and dinner – have been a part of American life since the beginning. In actuality, however, our current foodways took hundreds of years to solidify into what they are today.

In the times before the Industrial Revolution when most of the United States was agrarian, lunch was a much more important meal with heartier dishes that could sustain manual labor for the rest of the day. Meals mainly consisted of stews, called pottages, as these could be made easily in a large pot over a fire. Not until the late 1700s, taking cues from the British, did Americans begin to serve meat, vegetables, and grains separately on a single plate.

As the Industrial Revolution took hold and more people moved from working on farms to working in factories, eating lunch at home became more difficult. People had to eat smaller meals that they could easily carry to work and eat between shifts. At this point, dinner became more important because it was the only time of the day when the whole family could gather together for a meal.

Historically, snacking was problematic because it might spoil ones appetite for dinner and threaten the togetherness of the family. Beginning in the early 1900s, commercially and mass produced foods began to creep into American life. As these foods became more ubiquitous, the idea of snacking began to change, in no small part due to advertising.

In the conclusion, the author makes a succinct and insightful statement. “How we eat in the future will reflect who we are today, and how we eat today will determine in part who we will become tomorrow. Whether we know it or not, the state of the American meal is in our hands” (p. 219).

Idaho by Emily Ruskovich (2017)

noreply@blogger.com (Carlie) — Tue, 05 Mar 2019 16:50:00 +0000

Finished: March 4, 2019

(Fiction - PS3618.U7445 I33; 813/.6)

The novel begins with Ann and Wade. They are married, and Ann is obsessed with Wade’s tragic past. His first wife, Jenny, murdered one of their daughters; the other daughter ran from the scene and was never found. Wade now has dementia and does not remember any of it clearly.

Each chapter begins with a point in time, usually a year, and the story is not told chronologically. Also, the main perspective changes with the chapters. Sometimes told from Ann’s point of view, sometimes Jenny’s, sometimes Jenny’s cellmate in prison, sometimes Ann’s imaginary view of the daughters, and rarely from Wade’s perspective.

The writing is beautiful and the author is able to adeptly set the scene and the emotion. I appreciated reading about a setting I am familiar with in northern Idaho. The characters are not particularly lovable. The only character I really liked was the younger daughter, and that was not even really her but Ann’s imagined version of her.

This book frustrated me because each perspective was a woman living vicariously through other women. It felt like they were always escaping themselves and placing themselves at the whim of some other actor rather than having much of their own agency. When they did have agency, they were related to negative acts like violence and theft. I felt cheated that I didn’t get to know more about why Jenny killed her child.

The Dawn of Detroit: A Chronicle of Slavery and Freedom in the City of the Straits by Tiya Miles (2017)

noreply@blogger.com (Carlie) — Tue, 19 Feb 2019 20:48:00 +0000

Finished: February 18, 2019

(Nonfiction - F574.D457 M55; 977.4/3401)

Every couple of years I read a book either about Detroit or that is set in Detroit, often in historical settings. Each one gives me a little deeper insight into who I am based on the place I grew up. The idea of slavery in Detroit is not entirely new, but I had not considered it with much depth. Detroit is often posed as a place where slaves flee to in their journey toward freedom, not as a place of slavery. The older I get and the more I learn about American history, the more I realize that the nuance is often overlooked and there is no right side.

Miles begins the book in 1760 and moves through five periods, ending with the story of Elizabeth Denison who died in 1866. (The story of Elizabeth’s parents, Peter and Hannah, was intriguing, and I wish I had known about these figures before. This family’s role in the history of Detroit cannot be overstated.) Each of the periods explored were dominated by different rulers and who was in charge greatly influenced how slaves were viewed and treated. When the British pushed the French out of Detroit and into Canada, the social structure was put into upheaval and slaves did not fare as well. Likewise when Americans defeated the British.

Slavery in Detroit was different than slavery in the South. The plantation labor that dominated further south was replaced in Detroit with slaves working in shipping, hunting, hide processing, and other jobs related more closely to the fur trade. In addition, many of slaves in the Detroit River area were indigenous people. Bought and sold by Native groups as well as whites, these slaves were known as Panis.

This aspect of history has not been told often or deeply. The author uses primary documents to piece together the fragments of this mainly untold history. Much was not recorded or it was destroyed in fire. What she does present is a fascinating account of Afro-American and Native people’s subjugation and slavery’s deep roots in Detroit. Going forward when I read historical accounts, I will be looking for the enslaved people who are not mentioned but were integral to society.

The New Urban Crisis: How Our Cities Are Increasing Inequality, Deepening Segregation, and Failing the Middle Class – and What We Can Do About It by Richard Florida (2017)

noreply@blogger.com (Carlie) — Wed, 09 Jan 2019 18:27:00 +0000

Finished: January 7, 2019

(Nonfiction - HT123 .F6195; 307.760973)

I first heard of Richard Florida when I was an undergraduate student in an urban planning class. I thought his perspective was interesting and I finally got around to reading his most recent book. There is a lot of research here. Unfortunately, the visual data was presented very poorly. The graphs and charts require color while these were printed in black and white only. They were pretty impossible to decipher, dulling the impact. That left me with relying only on the narrative description of the data.

When I wasn’t sloughing through descriptions of charts and reading statistics, the gist of the book was interesting. The very reasons that make cities so successful are also making them fail in many other ways. The ideal would be for a city to provide a place to live and work for all segments of society. In many cities, this is becoming more and more difficult.

As more people focused on technology and creative careers move back into cities, they are pushing others out, often long-time residents. The service class which these upper crust lean on are barely able to even commute to work as they live in more affordable areas, far from transit lines and city centers. What has been created are segregated cities, divided by race, class, education, and profession.

He presents some ways to solve the problems of this ultimately unsustainable state of affairs. He describes seven pillars that puts cities at the center of the agenda: build smarter through regulation reform and land value taxes, improve transit, more affordable rental housing, improve wages of service jobs, combat poverty with a negative income tax, global efforts for more resilient cities, and allowing cities to make pragmatic decisions to create programs of intentional urban development.

The Sellout by Paul Beatty (2015)

noreply@blogger.com (Carlie) — Wed, 05 Dec 2018 19:10:00 +0000

This was a strange satire novel set in Dickens, a town in Los Angeles that has recently been erased from the map. The main character, Me or Bonbon, was raised by his father. Rather than attend school, his father subjected him to experiments and lessons on race. When his father is murdered by police officers, he takes over his father’s role in the community of talking locals down from suicide.

When Hominy, the last living member of the Our Gang films, attempts suicide and Bonbon saves him, Hominy vows to serve him as his slave. Bonbon never orders Hominy to do anything, though Hominy does refer to him as “Massa”. Hominy’s shows of servitude are absurd and comedically stereotypical, such as standing as a lawn jockey.

What gets Bonbon in trouble with the Supreme Court of the United States is his attempts to reinstate segregation. He has the idea to re-segregate a city bus as a gift to Hominy for his birthday. After this goes so well, he re-segregates a public school. No one really notices until the black and Latino students start doing so well on their tests. Then the white parents want their children to attend too.

Most of the novel is told through partially disjointed vignettes rather than a cohesive whole. The stream of conscious in Beatty’s style is poetic and easy to read though not completely conducive to storytelling. The main character is really racism itself – the pernicious ways that it seeps into consciousness and subsconsciousness, the attempts to dismiss it and its refusal to leave, the pain that remains and the pride that it wrested. There is no post-racial America, and any conjecture that there is deserves the farcical treatment that this novel provides.

The Chain: Farm, Factory, and the Fate of Our Food by Ted Genoways (2014)

noreply@blogger.com (Carlie) — Wed, 10 Oct 2018 17:53:00 +0000

Finished: October 9, 2018

(Nonfiction - HD9415 .G46; 338.7/664920973)

This book is divided into six parts, and in each part the author explores different aspects of industrial pork. The focus is mainly on the social aspects, but in order to fully explain how all of the pieces fit together, the reader learns quite a bit about the machinations surrounding getting pork products onto the shelves.

Topics covered include illnesses of pork factory workers brought on by faulty equipment and lax investigations, immigrant labor and how that trickled into local politics and housing, the difficulties of managing and conserving land and water when pork farms and factories are nearby, animal abuse in pork factories, and how supply and demand of pork products drives increased production and causes injuries, illnesses, and tainted food.

Some Things That Meant the World to Me by Joshua Mohr (2009)

noreply@blogger.com (Carlie) — Tue, 11 Sep 2018 20:23:00 +0000

Finished: September 10, 2018

(Fiction - PS3613.O379 S66; 813.6)

Rhonda is a man who has a deeply traumatic history of abuse and neglect. As the story oscillates between Rhonda’s present day and vignettes of his past, the reader realizes that Rhonda is not completely in touch with reality. I immediately felt bad for this character and each instance of his clinging to unhealthy and even sometimes retched relationships, solidified the feeling that his soul is in perpetual misery. Even the glimpses of hope are tinged with skeptical dread, waiting for the other shoe to drop.

The story unfolds slowly and there are glimpses of true horror. Thankfully Mohr spares the reader with too much detail. Most of the difficult parts are told through Rhonda’s visions of his childhood, visions he sees from the bottom of a dumpster. What we do learn is that Rhonda is no longer in contact with his mother or her abusive boyfriend, he grew up in a group home after poisoning the boyfriend, and he has very heavy dissociative disorder.

In the end, I was relieved that he managed to find the love of a mother that he lacked through his friendship with his neighbor. His mother’s neglect and blame left him haunted and damaged. It was a relief to see that his soul could begin to be healed.

The Smear: How Shady Political Operatives and Fake News Control What You See, What You Think, and How You Vote by Sharyl Attkisson (2017)

noreply@blogger.com (Carlie) — Mon, 27 Aug 2018 20:19:00 +0000

Finished: August 22, 2018

(Nonfiction - PN4888.C6 A85; 302.23/0973)

I was optimistic when beginning this book, thinking that I would get a better idea of the ways in which the public is being manipulated by what is reported and how. It was not long into it that I realized that this author has a strong agenda. While she claims to show how both liberals and conservatives use news outlets to twist the media for their own purposes, in actuality she focuses almost solely on the left and mainly on David Brock. In fact, she is so one-sided, I think she may have a personal beef with Brock.

Now, a year into the investigation of how Russia impacted the 2016 election, her opinions are even more irrelevant. That this book was almost entirely anecdote and opinion was another downfall. Not one note was included that corroborated her.

It was not lost on me that I was reading a book about media manipulation authored by someone who was trying to manipulate the reader.

Junk: Digging Through America’s Love Affair with Stuff by Alison Stewart (2016)

noreply@blogger.com (Carlie) — Tue, 07 Aug 2018 19:54:00 +0000

Finished: July 29, 2018

(Nonfiction - RC569.5.H63 S76; 616.85/84)

The treatment of this topic could have easily veered toward the sensational or exploitative side so I was very pleased when I began reading it that the author takes a much more measured approach. She was faced with a mountain of her own junk when her parents passed away, and that is when she came to realize that there is much more to how people feel about their stuff. She wanted to know more so she investigated people’s relationships with their possessions over a three year period.

She takes on junk in its many contours – community-wide yard sales, junk artists, space junk, junk business, up-cyclers and recyclers, collectors, repairers, and more – from the stance of an interested yet non-judgmental explorer. A recurring theme is how much the worth of an object is tied to its meaning for the individual.

Girls Walks into a Bar…: Comedy, Calamities, Dating Disasters, and a Midlife Miracle by Rachel Dratch (2012)

noreply@blogger.com (Carlie) — Fri, 27 Jul 2018 16:04:00 +0000

Finished: July 18, 2018

(Nonfiction - PN2287.D5495 A3; 792.702/8092)

This is not a book I would have chosen to read on my own, but a friend lent it to me so I wanted to give it a try. It is a memoir so it’s not a comprehensive biography, focusing mainly on Dratch’s life in the acting world and her personal life during this time and after.

Dratch has had an interesting career, mainly comedic. She relates that she is often frustratingly cast as a lesbian friend and found it difficult to be cast in more interesting roles after Saturday Night Live. She was even supposed to be Jenna on 30 Rock, but it was recast at the last minute to her disappointment.

Most of the book was about her dating life. She tended to date men with substance abuse issues so those did not work out. She finally met someone who was stable, and she became pregnant unexpectedly when she was 43 years old. She discusses how strange it was to navigate such a lifetime commitment with someone she barely knows.

There were definitely funny moments in the book, but not many laugh-out-louds. I did enjoy learning more about Dratch, her successes and travails, and how she was able to find happiness and a baby when she thought her time had passed.

Mink River by Brian Doyle (2010)

noreply@blogger.com (Carlie) — Tue, 05 Jun 2018 21:43:00 +0000

Finished: June 4, 2018

(Fiction - PS3604.O9547 M56; 813/.6)

Set in the rural town of Neawanaka on the Mink River near the Oregon coast, the lives of the residents are told through an intertwining narrative. Rambling and free from quotation marks, the characters are very rich and enduring. The storytelling was unique, as if the author took ten separate short stories and knit them together into one. It was occasionally tedious when the author used lists as a narrative device, though the effect was successful in evoking a descriptive setting.

My favorite character was a talking, philosophical crow named Moses. There was also the questing Worried Man, the protective Cedar, the wise Maple Head, the talented No Horses, the inventive Owen, and the kind Daniel. There were many more characters and each was quite charming.

Topsy: The Startling Story of the Crooked-Tailed Elephant, P.T. Barnum, and the American Wizard, Thomas Edison by Michael Daly (2013)

noreply@blogger.com (Carlie) — Sat, 28 Apr 2018 16:39:00 +0000

Finished: April 27, 2018

(Nonfiction - GV1831.E4 D35; 791.3/20929)

I have not read a book that left me so enraged at humanity in a very long time. I knew when I started what would happen to Topsy, but it was no less jarring and despicable. She was a baby elephant when she was taken from her mother and herd and shipped to the United States to live the rest of her life in circuses and captivity. She could have been just another elephant forgotten to history if she had not been cruelly electrocuted in a public display, her death forever immortalized on film, linking her in perpetuity with a reprehensible Thomas Edison.

This book takes us through the life of Topsy and the history of the world she lived in. Daly weaves her story with the story of circus elephants, the circuses of Forepaugh and Barnum & Bailey, the War of the Currents involving Westinghouse and Edison, and Coney Island. He creates a vivid picture of the late 1800s and the first years of the 1900s.

Since the publication of this book, many states, including New York State, have banned elephants from circuses, and Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus has ceased. I can take solace in that because it means we are progressing towards a more just existence. However, we still have a way to go until wild animals are completely banned in circuses.

I absolutely fell in love with Topsy and was devastated when reading of her death. Daly depicts her as smart and sociable. She should have been allowed to live out the end of her days in peace and deserved so much better than she received.

American Hookup: The New Culture of Sex on Campus by Lisa Wade (2017)

noreply@blogger.com (Carlie) — Fri, 09 Mar 2018 19:34:00 +0000

Finished: March 7, 2018

(Nonfiction - HQ27 .W33; 306.70973)

Maybe because I seemed to always have a boyfriend or maybe because I went to a commuter university and did not live on campus, but hooking up is not something I really engaged in. I can remember one instance when I was an adolescent when I met a boy camping and we fooled around a little, but that is the extent of my hookup experience. Hooking up is one of those behaviors that I know exists mostly through reality television shows. Until I read this book, I was not fully aware of how pervasive this practice is.

As an instructor, Wade assigned her students to write in journals all that they wished to share about sex and romance of themselves and those around them. From these journals, she relates anecdotes about how these students experience sexuality on campus. Using these stories and additional research, she is able to provide a picture of the current state of hooking up in a non-judgmental and approachable way.

She does not see any harm in hookups in and of itself. However, she does see that the practice often reflects inequalities in society at large in ways that are harmful to the social structure and to individual psyches. There is quite a bit of game-playing and pretending to like or not like others that is inauthentic. There is a general lack of romance and the sex is often not very rewarding, especially for women as shown through the lack of men’s interest in women’s pleasure. Gender inequality is also exposed through the focus on women’s sexiness and past sexual experiences. There continues to be far too many instances of sexual aggression and sexual assault victimizing women.

As a reflection of the general culture, heterosexual white men are still benefiting the most. This culture places those who engage with it on hierarchies in which men compete against each other to bed the most desirable women and women compete with other women to be the most desired. The author stresses that it is not the hookup that is a problem, but the culture that surrounds it. She concludes:

We are all in the fog. We face an onslaught of sexualized messaging designed to make us worry that our sex lives are inadequate. There is an erotic marketplace off campus, too, and it is distorted by prejudice, a fixation on wealth, and a shallow worship of youth and beauty. For certain, there is an orgasm gap between men and women outside of college, and the practices that enhance sexual encounters – communication, creativity, tolerance, confidence, and knowledge – are scarcer than they should be. We all tend to look to men for approval while valuing women’s opinions too little. Sexual violence is epidemic everywhere, and unfortunately anyone, male or female, can be cold and cruel (p. 248).

Dark Money: The Hidden History of the Billionaires Behind the Rise of the Radical Right by Jane Mayer (2016)

noreply@blogger.com (Carlie) — Mon, 12 Feb 2018 20:15:00 +0000

Finished: February 6, 2018

(Nonfiction - JC599.U5 M373; 320.520973)

The current political industrial complex is funded by big business in secretive ways that run counter to what our democracy was founded on. How this came to be took much less time than might be suspected. It was only about 100 years ago that we had a similar problem during the Gilded Age. The reforms that moved the country away from private business influencing politics have slowly eroded until we are in our current predicament.

The ability to keep this money flowing to political candidates and causes secretly is accomplished through so-called philanthropic organizations. These organizations include think tanks, academies, non-profit organizations, and clubs. By donating money to these organizations, they in-turn put money in the pockets of politicians and causes that big business dictates. There are even organizations in which the sole purpose is to hide the money.

While this all runs counter to what the majority hopes and aspires to as a democracy, it became possible after a contentious Supreme Court decision that allows corporations to spend money to influence elections. While business cannot give money directly to politicians, they can give money to other organizations that give money to politicians. This was a major legal rollback of 100 year law that prevented corporations from funding federal campaigns.

Reading this book a year into the Trump presidency, it is an interesting look back at how we got to where we are. How much Trump has benefited from dark money is unknown, but that big business is reaping the rewards of the changes his administration is making is apparent. The future is certain to involve a lot of money from a small number of actors who are intensely interested in their own corporate interests to the detriment of the well-being of the majority of Americans.

Bound to the Fire: How Virginia’s Enslaved Cooks Helped Invent American Cuisine by Kelley Fanto Deetz (2017)

noreply@blogger.com (Carlie) — Tue, 30 Jan 2018 19:08:00 +0000

Finished: January 28, 2018

(Nonfiction - E445.V8 D44; 641.59/296073)

I visited the Southeast for the first time this past summer, specifically the Gullah/Geechee region, and it was a very eye-opening experience for me. I had no idea that this culture and people even existed, and once again I felt the shortcomings of my education. I also visited an historic plantation for the first time. While it was in North Carolina rather than Virginia, I was able to get a glimpse of plantation life though in a superficial way.

>While I was travelling, the historical tours and plaques all seemed to focus on white history, and I knew that much was missing. Even when slaves were mentioned, there was a general lack of context or depth. When I learned about this book, I was really excited to read it to help me fill in more of the gaps of the history of the American South.

The author uses archaeological evidence, old cookbooks, folklore, and other historical records to provide a picture of what life was like for enslaved cooks on plantations. Cooks typically slept near the kitchen, which was sometimes a detached out building, rather than in field houses, this also meant that they never really had a break from their work. Their immediate family members also lived in these uncomfortable quarters which were very hot in the summer to help with the kitchen work.

Skilled cooks were very sought after and were worth more than other types of slaves. They brought over cooking techniques and flavors from their home lands, forever changing the nature of American cuisine. Meanwhile the slave owners received all of the credit for their hard work. The author also relates some individual slaves’ stories that highlight the day to day lives of persisting in a manner than keeps one literally bound to the fire.

Alice Fantastic by Maggie Estep (2009)

noreply@blogger.com (Carlie) — Tue, 26 Dec 2017 22:21:00 +0000

Finished: December 25, 2017

(Fiction - PS3555.S754 A79; 813/.54)

This novel tells the story of two sisters, Alice and Eloise, and their mother, Kimberly. Alice is a gambler focusing on horse racing, and Eloise makes stuffed animals. Kimberly rescues dogs. Honestly, that is as exciting as this book gets. It is written so that the chapters shift from one narrator to the other, each of the women getting their opportunity to tell their story.

With these interesting career choices and shifting narrations, this book should have been much more interesting than it was. Nothing really happens and what little does occur is boring. The writing style fell very flat. Each character was indistinguishable from the other and the shifting narrators made that even more obvious. I was pretty uninterested through most of it.

The Great Perhaps by Joe Meno (2009)

noreply@blogger.com (Carlie) — Thu, 07 Dec 2017 17:27:00 +0000

Finished: December 6, 2017

(Fiction - PS3563.E53 G74; 813/.54)

This novel focuses on the Casper family. The father/husband/son, Jonathan, is a scientist obsessed with finding the elusive giant squid. So obsessed that he barely realizes the rest of his family exists. The mother/wife, Madeline, is also a scientist but she researches bird behavior. She is growing increasingly frustrated with her husband and her work. Amelia and Thisbe, their daughters, have their own inner turmoil. While Amelia experiences teenage angst at the injustices of the world, Thisbe is fixated with prayer and salvation in a non-religious family. Finally, Jonathan’s father, Henry, is slowly dying in an adult facility.

As each of these characters go about their mundane lives, they secretly hold disappointments of themselves and each other. As they move along they find it more difficult to go on with the status quo. They each have different ways to break out of it all. In the end, they realize that what they really need is truth and declaration in order to realize the changes they want.

Nothing much really happens in this book. None of the characters are particularly likeable. There is no protagonist or antagonist, per se. The side stories are meandering and a little boring. Nothing really feels connected as the characters also feel. None of the emotions and characters seem genuine.

Why Time Flies: A Mostly Scientific Investigation by Alan Burdick (2017)

noreply@blogger.com (Carlie) — Thu, 16 Nov 2017 19:23:00 +0000

Finished: November 15, 2017

(Nonfiction - QB213 .B925; 529/.2)

On the face of it, it seems like it would be difficult to fill an entire book on the subject of time. But that is just the thing, time is subjective. And it is social. Time doesn’t really exist out there. It exists as a social contract among all of us. It also exists in each of the cells of our bodies. It also stretches and contracts depending on perception and busyness.

Burdick does enter some nuances of time measurement and scientific thought that I assumed would be more tedious and boring than he managed to present them. In all, I learned a great deal about how researchers are currently approaching the topic of time, a perennial area of interest to scientists and philosophers.

Last Girl Before Freeway: The Life, Loves, Losses, and Liberation of Joan Rivers by Leslie Bennetts (2016)

noreply@blogger.com (Carlie) — Fri, 20 Oct 2017 14:55:00 +0000

Finished: October 16, 2017

(Nonfiction - PN2287.R55 B46; 792.7602/80922)

Joan Rivers was a paradox. She ran by her own internal compass and what may have seemed completely contradictory to the outside world made perfect sense to her. She broke gender boundaries in comedy but adamantly refused the title feminist. When she made comedic inroads for other women, she didn’t bring them up with her and was constantly competing. She hated her own looks but made a career out of making fun of how other women look. She was obsessed with the finer things and made friends with powerful, entitled people but was herself a crass, loud, Jewish woman. She was outspoken for gay rights but remained a staunch Republican. She was a member of the Writers Guild of America but refused to support the writers during their strike. It seems that regardless of the venue, Rivers loved to provoke people.

Bennetts interviewed dozens of people for this book to get first-hand perspectives of who Joan Rivers really was. She also often uses quotes from books written by Rivers herself. From childhood, through her struggles with marriage and her career, to becoming a mother, dealing with her husband’s suicide and the effect that had on her career, her resurgence as a fashion/insult comic and QVC jewelry slinger, and up through her last, still very productive years, Bennetts details the many lives of Joan Rivers.

Rivers was a woman who never stopped. Her all-consuming obsession with success and her pervasive fear that she could lose it all (again), kept her moving. Even until the last days of her life, she kept working just as hard as she always did. Love her or hate her (or both at the same time), she earned and deserves respect for her dedication and work ethic, for her refusal to accept no for an answer and to abide by the rules, and for her generosity.