Too much for me

THE HOMECOMING OF SAMUEL LAKE
 by Jenny Wingfield

In Jenny Wingfield’s debut novel, The Homecoming of Samuel Lake, the title character is a Methodist minister who brings his wife Willadee and their three children, sons Noble and Bienville, and daughter Swan, to Arkansas to attend a family reunion at his in-laws, the Moses clan. After Willadee’s father commits suicide on the night of the reunion, the Lake family stays on for a while, only to learn that Samuel has not been granted a parish for the upcoming year. At loose ends, Samuel decides they will stay with Willadee’s family until God makes clear what his next step should be. During their stay, Swan befriends a neighbor, eight-year-old Blade Ballenger, who is horrifically abused by his father Ras, known to many as “Satan’s stepson.” When Blade commits a rare act of defiance against his father, his friendship with Swan will have dramatic consequences for the entire Moses-Lake family.

This book is difficult for me to review as it turned out to be much different than what I expected. I intentionally avoid books that feature child abduction, abuse or murder as a plot line because I know that I will not like the book no matter how well-written it might be. The problem here is that apart from a single reference to a “terrifying father,“ the jacket synopsis gives no inkling of the graphic violence against children and animals that is part and parcel of this story.

Compounding the connundrum for me is the fact that The Homecoming of Samuel Lake has several elements that are the best of what I like about Southern literature.  The author has a wicked sense of humor that is reflected in the thoughts and actions of her colorful characters. Swan, the outspoken eleven-year-old tomboy daughter of Reverend Lake put me in mind of that jewel of Southern literature, Scout from To Kill a Mockingbird. My favorite character was Willadee’s brother, Toy Moses, a silent, strong man, whose only apparent weakness is his inability to see his despicable wife for what she really is. Willadee’s mother Calla is a wise, strong, and loving matriarch, who endures life’s ups and downs with equanimity. Through beautifully descriptive passages, the author brings to life the atmosphere of the rural South, a setting that I particularly enjoy, and her portrayal of it’s customs, mores, and dialect, felt wholly authentic.

At bottom, though, I just could not get past those parts of the book that were so disturbing to me, and as a result I never became fully invested in the story or the characters. It is for this reason that I have not assigned a rating, or a recommendation. You’re on your own on this one.

I received an advance reader’s edition from the publisher, Random House, Inc., as part of Library Thing’s Early Reviewers program. The Homecoming of Samuel Lake will be released on July 12, 2011.

Weekend Cooking (7): Review

TO HAVE AND TO KILL by Mary Jane Clark

My rating:  3 of 5 stars

I love culinary mysteries, so when I saw a new series with the subtitle "A Wedding Cake Mystery," I thought, okay, I'm in.  Unfortunately for me, this first installment was mostly mystery, and very little culinary.  

Piper Donovan is a 27-year-old struggling actress in New York City who returns home to live with her parents, bakery shop owner Terri, and retired policeman, Vin.  Shortly before Christmas, one of Piper's friends, soap opera star Glenna Brooks, becomes engaged and Piper volunteers her mother to supply the wedding cake.  Unbeknownst to Piper, Terri's eyesight is failing and she refuses to take on the job, leaving Piper to do it herself.  When Glenna's co-star Travis York ends up dead in a scenario in which Glenna may have been the intended victim, the wedding is not the only thing in jeopardy.  As Piper and her friend, FBI agent Jack Lombardi investigate, the murderer strikes two more times, resulting in a second death.  The plot moves along quickly, in short staccato bursts of two and three page chapters, culminating in a final confrontation in which Piper, not surprisingly, prevails.

As a cozy mystery, this book was a fun, distracting afternoon read.  Piper is a likeable character, as are her parents, and best friend Lombardi.  The identity of the killer becomes fairly apparent in the last 50 pages or so, but I never really thought that cozies are read for the "mystery" part so much as for the atmosphere and/or appealability of the characters.  I do think that there was a bit much going on here in terms of plot lines -- Terri's struggle with the onset of macular degeneration; Piper's ambivalence about giving up her independence; the hint of a burgeoning romance between Piper and Jack; and of course, the baking angle.  In the resulting mix, the bakery aspect gets short shrift, and that was somewhat of a disappointment for me.

Because I liked the Piper character so much, however, I will give the second installment in the series a try; hopefully that one will be a culinary mystery with a capital C, small m.

I received a hardcover edition of this book from the publisher, William Morrow, an imprint of HarperCollins.

Weekend Cooking is a fun event hosted by Beth Fish Reads in which bloggers share food-related posts.  Stop by and see what's cooking this week!

Another winner from Other Press: Review and Giveaway

THE RESERVOIR by John Milliken Thompson

My rating:  4.5 of 5 stars

The adage about good things coming in small packages translates nicely to the way I feel about certain smaller publishing houses. One of the first books I reviewed on this blog was  The Quickening, a wonderful literary novel published last year by Other Press. Needless to say, I was excited to try another one of Other’s offerings and once again, I was rewarded with a fantastic reading experience.

In The Reservoir, author John Milliken Thompson took the transcript from an actual first degree murder case that was tried in Virginia in the post-Civil War era, and constructed a fictional account of what led to the victim’s death and what followed the jury's verdict. The defendant never testified and the trial evidence, which was entirely circumstantial, left open some question about his guilt of first degree murder; Thompson uses that ambiguity to create a totally engrossing work, featuring authentic characters who populate a dark and steamy Southern world where nothing is clear, least of all questions of guilt or innocence.

The story has roots in an age-old tale: two brothers, Tommie and Willie Cluverius are in love with the same woman, their distant cousin, Lillie Madison. Tommie is the younger brother, a lawyer, with dreams of seeing the world, while Willie is the sturdy, reliable one who works the land and dreams of re-building the farm their father lost during the War. At first Tommie struggles with his feelings for Lillie because of Willie, but he ultimately finds himself drawn to her. Eventually, however, Tommie’s ambition gets the best of him, and he shifts his attentions to a richer and more socially respectable woman. When Lillie’s pregnant body is discovered floating in the reservoir, it is not long before Tommie is charged with her murder.

The reader knows from the outset that Tommie was with Lillie at the reservoir the night she died, but the circumstances of her death are not revealed until much later. The narration alternates between the present as the investigation proceeds, and the past, with Tommie reflecting back on the events preceding Lillie’s death. In this way, Thompson deftly maintains a level of tension that kept me riveted to the pages; I started out thinking I knew what happened, but new wrinkles kept appearing. I found this narrative device to be brilliantly executed in that even though much of the book is written from Tommie's perspective, his voice never tips his hand as to whether he is responsible for Lillie's death.

I like reading those novels set in the American South with a "gothic” feel, and Thompson gets that feeling exactly right. The miasma of the post-Civil War South, the family secrets, even the haze and humidity are all here so as to make iced tea and a fan almost a requirement to read this book comfortably. In the last 100 pages or so, wherein Tommie must come to terms with the jury's decision, Thompson outdoes himself; the imagery and atmosphere are simply stunning.  Consider this glimpse into Tommie‘s thoughts as he ruminates on his life:

“Life is so futile, he thinks. But there had been moments of such startling beauty that the veil of the eternal had briefly slipped and you could see that heaven was real.” (334)

Thompson is a wonderful storyteller. This debut novel is rich in plot, setting and emotion.  I wonder what he will come up with next. He has certainly set the bar high.

I received a finished copy of the book from the publisher.   The Reservoir will be released on June 21,  2011, and has recently been chosen by SIBA as a 2011 Summer Okra Pick.   

Other Press has kindly agreed to give a finished copy of The Reservoir to one lucky winner.  To enter this giveaway, please leave a comment indicating your desire to participate and include your email address.  Entrants who are followers of this blog will receive an additional entry. Residents of U.S. and Canada only and no post office boxes please.   Contest ends at 11:59 p.m. on July 3, 2011.  Good luck to all!

One of the best books I will read this year

FAITH by Jennifer Haigh

My rating:  5 of 5 stars

Set during the height of the priest molestation scandal in the Boston Archdiocese, Faith provides a gut wrenching look into the life of a family whose son and brother is one of the accused priests.  So much has been written, and rightly so, from the perspective of the molestation victims.  What makes this story so unique is that as the reader, you are drawn into the world of the accused, a person that at first blush  would appear to be deserving of little or no compassion.  Haigh has put a personal face on the clergy at the heart of these scandals, and in so doing, has delivered a powerful, captivating novel that held me in its grip until the bitter, and I mean that literally, end.

Father Arthur Breen entered the seminary at the age of fourteen, and after assuming his first curate position eleven years later, he serves the church faithfully; in the process he ministers to men his age who are experiencing lives full of things unknown for him.  Entering his fifties, Father Breen seems burnt out, when his housekeeper's grandson, seven-year old Aidan Conlon, becomes a fixture at the rectory after Aidan's drug-addicted mother Kath returns to the parish.  Father Breen appears to have a new lease on life, spending more and more time with the neglected Aidan and his wild child mother.  In a dramatic turn, Kath accuses Father Breen of molesting Aidan, and within days, Father Breen has lost everything:  he is removed from his position, kicked out of the rectory, and exiled to a dingy apartment to await his fate.

Of course, Father Breen is not the only one to be affected by the charges.  His half-brother Mike, a successful real estate salesman in the area, has three young boys, and a wife who has always been less than comfortable with her husband's Catholicism.  Mike struggles with his feelings about his brother, and in an attempt to reconcile his doubts about Art's complicity, Mike finds himself in an ill-advised relationship with Kath that threatens to destroy his carefully constructed life.  In creating thoroughly nuanced characters, with as many facets as a well-cut diamond, Haigh has managed, in surprising ways, to make each of the principals in the story at times worthy of pity and disdain.

What really happened to Aidan?  What was Father Breen's crime, if any?  As the reader, you may think you know, but the story that unfolds keeps you guessing.  The most captivating aspect to this novel, though, are the tragic human stories of the accused and accuser alike.  To be sure, you want to know what Father Breen's real story is with respect to the accusation, but what keeps you enthralled is the sheer humanness of the emotion, the sadness, loneliness, wilful ignorance, desperation, and raw longing of all those involved.

Perfectly constructed, Haigh uses the narrative device of having Art's sister Shelia looking back on the events, a method that maintains the tension even as you begin to sense Art's ultimate fate.  Although Shelia is never physically described, her voice is so distinct, her personality so real and tangible, it is as if she were standing next to me while I read. 

There are many subsidiary questions floating under the surface of this story.  Obviously, those of faith, religion, parental responsibility, the culpability of the Church, the repercussion of its insistence on celibacy, are all here.  This is without question a thought-provoking novel.  But for me, this was simply an agonizing story, beautifully written.  Although the year is not year half-over, I can say, without reservation, that this is one of the best books I will read this year.  You can take that on faith. 

I received an advance reader's edition of Faith from the publisher, HarperCollins, through TLC Book Tours.  Faith was released in May of 2011.

Weekend Cooking (6): Book Review

DON'T KILL THE BIRTHDAY GIRL
Tales from an Allergic Life by
Sandra Beasley

My rating:  3.5 of 5 stars

Imagine that you are five years-old and you have to be afraid to kiss your mother because she may have just eaten ice cream; or a sandwich; or a veggie burger; or any number of other things. That is the world Sandra Beasley lived in as she and her family learned to navigate her life-threatening food allergies. In her memoir, Don’t Kill the Birthday Girl, a phrase coined as a reminder to party guests not to touch Sandra once they had indulged in birthday cake, Beasley gives a fascinating and eye-opening account of her experiences. After reading her story, I will no longer bemoan the fact that there are some foods I like too much, but rather, will be eminently grateful that there are no foods that can literally kill me.

I picked this book up because I was curious to learn more about the increasing prevalence of food allergies: when I was growing up, as far as I knew, no one in my elementary school classes faced this issue, and none of my high school friends did either. However, like many parents, I have had the experience of being told not to send peanut butter products in my daughter’s school lunches and several of my daughter‘s friends have varying degrees of food sensitivities. I was also interested to see how Beasley’s family coped with her particularly extreme form of food allergy in that she is allergic to so many things, and her reactions are so severe. Her mother’s vigilance had to extend even to non-food substances in the classroom: did you know that Elmer’s Glue contains dairy and that there is wheat in Play-Doh? As a mother, I was particularly taken by the strength Beasley’s mother displayed in dealing with the ever-present threat that something Sandra would eat might kill her, without turning Sandra into a neurotic mess.

But this is not a book exclusively about Beasley’s childhood.

Although the life of a food allergic child is hard in the respect that he or she can never just be one of the crowd at school functions or on school trips, Beasley makes the point that there is at least the feeling that the young child is protected by her parents.  Consider for a moment the trepidation that any young adult feels as they go off to college to live on their own for the first time.  Now imagine that same individual making that transition knowing that an inadvertent ingestion of any number of different foods could result in a hospital admission, or even worse, be fatal.  Beasley also gives voice to the concerns of severely allergic adults, as when she expresses misgivings about how she will feed her own children, when contact with milk has the potential to send her into anaphylactic shock.  This was sort of a revelation to me, as I tended to think of “food allergy” exclusively in terms of how limiting it is for a young child.

Beasley confesses to a love of food facts and trivia, and that affinity is evident in this book as she writes about the rituals and customs that include food as part of the tradition. There is also a fair amount of science mixed in with the personal narrative, but it is, for the most part, eminently readable. Particularly interesting to me was the analysis of whether it is better to introduce small bits of an allergen in an attempt to desensitize versus a protocol of total abstinence, and the implications of the now fairly ubiquitous presence of soy protein in the American food chain. The only place where I thought her writing got a little dry was when she wanders into a discussion of food labeling legislation, but that was only a small part of the book.

What impressed me so much about Beasley is that she is entirely even-handed when discussing her situation. I have to admit that I anticipated that this memoir might take one of two tacks: somewhere along the lines of a “poor me” attitude, or alternatively, that of a zealot who insists that those around her must make accommodations no matter what the cost. There is not a hint of either such perspective here. Instead, Beasley’s story is an upbeat one, told with a keen sense of humor and irony, and she repeatedly makes the point that she is primarily responsible for keeping herself safe.  I have never met Beasley, and yet, from her voice, I really like her. So much so, that when she describes a mouth-watering meal that she was able to enjoy in a famous New Orleans restaurant, I wanted to shout yes because I was so happy that she could have such a joyful dining experience.

Chances are there is someone in your circle of friends and family who suffers from some form of food allergy, but you certainly don’t have to have a loved one with a food allergy to appreciate Beasley’s story. This is a totally engaging memoir that I enthusiastically recommend.

I received an advance reader’s edition of the book from Crown Publishers, a division of Random House, Inc. Don’t Kill The Birthday Girl goes on sale on July 12, 2011.

Weekend Cooking is a weekly event hosted by Beth Fish Reads in which bloggers link up food-related posts.  Stop by and see what's cooking this week!

A good idea that never quite took off

THE SUMMER OF THE BEAR
 by Bella Pollen

My rating:  2.5 of 5 stars

High expectations about a book can come from a variety of sources; reviews, word of mouth, even a great cover. I started The Summer of the Bear believing that I would love the book because of the synopsis on the back. I came away with mixed feelings, and am not sure if it is because I expected so much. At bottom, this was a book that I liked, but did not love.

Sometime in 1980, a trained bear that had been brought to the Outer Hebrides in Scotland to film a commercial was inadvertently released and spent the next several months roaming the island. At roughly the same time, reports surfaced that a naval installation in the area was leaking significant amounts of radioactive material, placing the residents at great risk. Using these two real-life incidents as a framework, Bella Pollen has created a novel that tells of one family’s struggle to heal from the sudden death of a husband and father.

During the height of the Cold War, Nicky Fleming is in the English diplomatic corps posted in Bonn with his wife, Letty and their three children: eldest daughter Georgie, a studious 17 year-old somewhat lacking in confidence; her darkly sarcastic younger sister Alba, and 8 year-old brother Jamie, who appears to suffer from an Asperger’s-like syndrome in which he understands things only in the literal sense. After Nicky is found dead from an apparent fall off the embassy roof, rumors begin to swirl about his possible treasonous activities. With no permanent home, Letty takes their children and returns to the Outer Hebrides of her childhood. There, in addition to the normal feelings of shock and loss that accompany a spouse’s death, Letty must cope with the anguish of not knowing exactly what Nicky was up to, and whether he committed suicide, as those in the embassy maintain. At the same time, unbeknownst to Letty, Georgie is wrestling with the implications of a recent trip she and her father made to East Berlin, trying to sort out what happened in light of the accusations being made against him.

When the family arrives in Scotland, word gets out that a trained circus bear has escaped captivity and is loose on the island. For Jamie, this news holds particular significance in that just days before his death, Nicky promised to take Jamie to the circus to see a bear act. Given Jamie’s penchant for taking everything literally, he ultimately becomes convinced that the bear is the embodiment of his father’s spirit, which may or may not in fact be true given all that follows.

This book was truly an up and down reading experience for me. There are some keenly haunting moments; one in particular, stems from the oh-so-literal Jamie’s attempt to find his father at a London brothel named “Heaven.” Equally poignant are any number of scenes involving Alba as her sadness morphs into searing, angry outbursts and she struggles to combat the desperate feeling that her world is crumbling by smoking, drinking and shoplifting. Beautiful, lyrical passages abound.

At other times, though, the writing failed to engage, and the story became somewhat tedious. What I thought I would love most about the book, the idea of the bear watching over this disintegrating family was there -- but only in flashes; it was an idea that never quite took off. By the end, Letty believes that she has solved the mystery regarding the circumstances of Nicky’s death, and as a result, the family is allowed to pick up the pieces and go on. This is one that I am not sorry I saw through to the last page, but in all honesty, it is probably not one that I would recommend.

I received an advance reader’s copy of The Summer of the Bear from Inkwell Management. The Summer of the Bear will be released in June of 2011 by Atlantic Monthly Press, an imprint of Grove/Atlantic, Inc.

Waiting on Wednesday

Waiting on Wednesday is a fun event hosted by Jill at Breaking the Spine in which bloggers highlight books that they are eagerly anticipating.  This week I chose:

August 2011 Release

From goodreads.com:

Hang down your head, Tom Dooley…The folk song, made famous by the Kingston Trio, recounts a tragedy in the North Carolina mountains after the Civil War. Laura Foster, a simple country girl, was murdered and her lover Tom Dula was hanged for the crime. The sensational elements in the case attracted national attention: a man and his beautiful, married lover accused of murdering the other-woman; the former governor of North Carolina spearheading the defense; and a noble gesture from the prisoner on the eve of his execution, saving the woman he really loved. With the help of historians, lawyers, and researchers, Sharyn McCrumb visited the actual sites, studied the legal evidence, and uncovered a missing piece of the story that will shock those who think they already know what happened—and may also bring belated justice to an innocent man. What seemed at first to be a sordid tale of adultery and betrayal was transformed by the new discoveries into an Appalachian Wuthering Heights. Tom Dula and Ann Melton had a profound romance spoiled by the machinations of their servant, Pauline Foster. Bringing to life the star-crossed lovers of this mountain tragedy, Sharyn McCrumb gifts understanding and compassion to her compelling tales of Appalachia, and solidifies her status as one of today's great Southern writers.

I love the sound of this one don't you?  What are you waiting for this week?