My Work

Olga Ravn; translated from the Danish by Sophi Hersi Smith and Jennifer Russell

My Work by Olga Ravn, translated from the Danish by Sophi Hersi Smith and Jennifer Russell, moves haphazardly between prose, poetry, diary entries, letters, information pamphlets, short biographies of mothers who were authors, and literary references, all of which express the complexities of motherhood.

The novel rotates between two protagonists who are aspects of the same individual: Anna, the ostensible author of the journals of her pregnancy, birth, and her son’s toddler years; and the unnamed narrator who combs through these journals and tries to organize and make sense of them. Both narrators are writers. The scattered, hodge-podge, and fragmentary nature of the narrative is accentuated by the non-linear timeline which includes different beginnings and endings. The novel moves back and forth between the two narrators as they converse and question one another. Their relationship is fraught with tension. At one point, Anna gets so frustrated, she stabs the narrator to death, waits for her to revive, and stabs her, again.

Anna describes her anxiety and depression after becoming a mother. She is haunted by feelings of inadequacy for the task of parenting. Plagued with suicidal thoughts, she undergoes therapy, which helps to stabilize her. She feels alienated from her own body during pregnancy and experiences ambivalence toward the infant for erasing her identity. She charts how the pregnancy and birth have transformed her relationship with her husband.

The strength of the novel lies in its unflinching interrogation of the drudgery, tedium, exhaustion, and isolation many women experience upon becoming mothers. The daily and seemingly endless grind of feedings, diaper changes, sleepless nights, and screaming babies is described in graphic detail as a mother’s work with the home as her work place. Anna experiences contradictory impulses of wanting to abandon the baby and never wanting to put him down. Since motherhood is a job that intrudes on women’s lives, their bodies, their creativity, and their very sense of self, Anna wonders why we bother to have children, at all. She questions the value and purpose of motherhood. She claims that because women are socialized to believe the experience of pregnancy, birthing, and child-rearing are painless and rewarding, they are ashamed to admit feeling otherwise.

In this stylistically unique novel, Olga Ravn powerfully evokes the disorientation, conflicting impulses, isolation, and loss of selfhood that women may experience in early motherhood. Her experimental narrative dares to voice what some women feel as they struggle to soothe a screaming baby during the long hours of yet another sleepless night.

The Diaries of Jane Somers

Doris Lessing

The Diary of a Good Neighbor is one of two novels published in The Diaries of Jane Somers by Doris Lessing. The novel is a meditation on aging and on the treatment of the elderly. It unfolds in the first-person point of view of Jane (Jannna) Somers and is written in a diary format.

Janna is a successful, self-assured, impeccably-dressed, and stylish middle aged assistant editor of a fashionable woman’s magazine. Her entire focus is on her work and on maintaining her polished appearance. Her self-absorption interferes with her ability to maintain anything other than superficial relationships. After the death of her husband in what was presumably their happy marriage, Janna realizes she never really talked to him or got to know him. She had avoided ministering to his needs while he was dying. Similarly, when her grandmother and mother were dying, Janna’s sister took care of them because Janna couldn’t.

One night, Janna has a chance encounter with 90-year-old Maudie Fowler, a disgruntled, elderly curmudgeon. Spurred by feelings of guilt for neglecting her husband and mother during their illness, Janna befriends Maudie. She begins visiting Maudie in her basement flat. The place reeks of urine. The stench of a filthy kitchen and soiled, dirty clothes permeate the atmosphere. Janna rolls up her sleeves and begins cleaning for Maudie, buying her groceries and new underwear, and even bathing Maudie of the filth and excrement that has lodged itself on her body. The two become friends and enjoy lengthy conversations in which Maudie shares stories of her life.

Janna juggles the demands of her job with regular visits to Maudie. When Joyce, her co-worker and friend, leaves for America with her husband, Janna is devastated. She doesn’t understand why Joyce willingly abandons her work and her life in England to be with a man who repeatedly betrays her with his love affairs. Meanwhile, Janna has become emotionally attached to Maudie. Her empathy with Maudie extends to other elderly people she encounters. She sympathizes with their daily struggles to perform household chores, find food, and keep themselves clean, all the while staunchly insisting on their independence. Janna also becomes sensitized to the many efforts of others to shut away the elderly in homes where the rest of the population cannot see them.

Lessing writes in painstaking, clinical detail of the indignities of old age, of stunted mobility, of frailty, of the struggles to perform even the most basic activities, and of the feelings of shame associated with asking for help. Janna’s epiphany is gradual. She grows to admire Maudie and her fierce determination to maintain the self-respect and dignity to which she is entitled. Where once she had once dehumanized the elderly, rendered them invisible, considered them dirty and witch-like, and wanted them hidden away, Janna now seeks and enjoys their company. Recognizing them as resilient survivors, she appreciates the elderly as having once had rich, vibrant lives and loves with powerful stories to tell that can benefit us all.

Days at the Morisaki Bookshop

Satoshi Yagisawa; trans. Eric Ozawa

Days at the Morisaki Bookshop by Satoshi Yagisawa, translated from the Japanese by Eric Ozawa, is a light, heart-warming read about how literature can help one to find one’s voice.

The narrative unfolds in the voice of Takako, a 25-year-old female who thinks she is in love with an office mate. When this same office mate announces his marriage to a co-worker, Takako is broken-hearted. She quits her job, and, at the invitation of her Uncle Satoru, moves into the room above his Morisaki bookshop in Tokyo.

Initially, Takako is lethargic, depressed, and spends a lot of time sleeping. Eventually, however, she picks up a classic novel and starts reading. The more she immerses herself in books, the better she feels about herself and the more she appreciates her uncle’s kindness towards her. Her self-confidence increases; her perspective expands. When she feels strong enough, she moves out of the bookshop and finds her own place. She returns periodically to visit her uncle and to help him figure out why his wife who had unexpectedly abandoned him years before suddenly shows up. In the process of solving the mystery, Takaka befriends a fellow book-lover, a friendship that leads to a relationship.

Told in simple, unadorned language, Takako’s voice grows from that of a self-obsessed child to that of an assertive, self-assured young woman, capable of empathy, unafraid to confront her former boyfriend, and unafraid to take risks. She helps her uncle navigate his relationship with his wife and is instrumental in reuniting them. She attributes her transformation to the books she read at her uncle’s Morisaki Bookshop. As she phrases it, reading “opened up a door I had never known existed.”

Although lacking in depth and a little uneven, the novel is short, engaging, and a quick read. Its premise reinforces what all book lovers already know: reading has the power to transform lives.

Wandering Stars

Tommy Orange

Wandering Stars by Tommy Orange is both a sequel and a prequel to Orange’s novel, There, There. It begins in the past by exploring the lineage of Orvil Red Feather, the high school student shot and badly wounded in the powwow that ends Orange’s first novel, There, There.

Wandering Stars opens with the 1864 Sand Creek Massacre in Colorado where the army slaughtered and mutilated members of the Cheyenne and Arapaho. Jude Star, a teenager, narrowly survives the massacre and is incarcerated in a prison castle in Florida where he feels the full effect of the policy of “Kill the Indian, Save the Man.” His son, Charles, is sent to the abusive Carlisle boarding school. His way of coping with the experience is through drugs. His partner, Opal Viola Bear Shield, gives birth to their daughter, Victoria Bear Shield. Opal is the grandmother of the half -sisters, Opal Viola Victoria Bear Shield and Jacqui Red Feather.

Opal and Jacqui raise Jacqui’s three grandsons, Loother, Orvil, and Lony Red Feather. This is the same Orvil who was hit by a stray bullet while dancing in the powwow. Opal assumes care-taking responsibilities for her sisters’ grandsons, providing them with a loving home to return to—something denied their ancestors. But the challenge in helping them survive and keeping them safe is daunting.

Spanning over 150 years, the novel alternates between first, second, and third person points of view to capture the different perspectives, different time frames, and different angles of the same experience. The characters struggle with identity, dislocation, poverty, and drug and alcohol addiction. This kaleidoscopic portrait illustrates that the effects of trauma, dispossession, and attempted erasure of a race are transmitted from one generation to the next. Trauma is generational. The root causes of drug and alcohol addiction are traced to the deep wounds that go back decades. Characters struggle to learn about their culture, their past, who they are, where they came from, and what happened to their ancestors. The novel also stresses the important role stories play in establishing identity and culture. It explores the issue of who has been denied voice in historical records and from whose perspective the history has been recorded.

Tommy Orange’s novel is a powerful and scathing indictment of the systemic genocide and colonization experienced by Native Americans whose ancestors were massacred and who experienced compulsory dislocation and forced assimilation. The effects of these brutal policies continue to haunt subsequent generations.

Irma Voth

Miriam Toews

Irma Voth by Miriam Toews unfolds in the first-person voice of Irma, a nineteen-year-old woman in a Mennonite community in the Chihuahuan desert in Mexico. Irma and her family relocated from Canada for a reason not revealed until the end of the novel.

Irma is ostracized by her intolerant, abusive father because she marries a Mexican. Her husband abandons her because she doesn’t know “how to be a good wife.” Irma has been sheltered all her life. She struggles to understand what to say and how to behave. When a film crew shows up to shoot a movie about the Mennonite community, Irma agrees to serve as the translator since she speaks English, Spanish, and the Plattdeutsch of the Mennonite community.

Irma has a dry sense of humor. She feeds the German female protagonist zany translations of the film director’s instructions. She observes the crew and is ever curious to learn about them and life outside her community. When Aggie, her thirteen-year-old sister, is beaten by their father for spending time with Irma and the film crew, Irma decides to run away with her sister. She agrees to her mother’s request to take their new-born baby sister along. The three girls travel to Mexico City where they are helped by random strangers and where Irma finds employment and a place to live. These many acts of kindness stretch plausibility. The girls never encounter harassment or danger even though they travel alone. Everyone they meet is kind and offers guidance and a helping hand, all of which is wonderful but may not be too realistic.

Irma’s vision expands gradually as she navigates life from the claustrophobic environment of her upbringing. From her child-like behavior with her former husband, she evolves into a mature woman, responsible for her younger sisters. The film crew propels her to adulthood, self-discovery, and freedom. She is intelligent, tough, brave, and resilient, qualities she doesn’t discover in herself until she escapes from her stifling environment. Her interiority and dialogue alternate between dry wit, sarcasm, panic, humor, a tortured sadness for harboring a family secret, and a heavy responsibility for her sisters.

The relationship between Irma and Aggie is one of the strengths of the novel and is depicted with authenticity. They argue and bicker like most siblings, with Aggie exploiting every opportunity to challenge her older sister’s authority. But their love for and bond with one another is unshakeable. Irma’s teetering, growing self-awareness is another strength. Her plunge to freedom opens up new horizons for herself and for her younger sisters. She finds her voice in a coming-of-age story that is both dark and uplifting and which, unfortunately, causes her to feel guilt for tragic events beyond her control.

Empress of the Nile: The Daredevil Archaeologist who Saved Egypt's Ancient Temples from Destruction

Lynne Olson

Empress of the Nile: The Daredevil Archaeologist who saved Egypt’s Ancient Temples from Destruction by Lynne Olson is a fascinating biography of the intrepid Christiane Desroches-Noblecourt.

Born in 1913 in France, Christiane had the good fortune to have progressive parents who encouraged her to pursue her interests. She developed a passion early in life for Ancient Egypt. She studied Egyptology and went on to become a curator at the Louvre. At the time of the Nazi occupation of France, she assisted in transporting the Louvre’s greatest treasures to safe havens outside of Paris to protect France’s national treasures from being plundered by the Nazis. Active in the resistance against Nazi occupation, she survived interrogation by the Nazis.

Her spirit throughout her illustrious career was defiant and fearless. She put that spirit to use while working in many archaeological digs in Egypt, developing a name for herself as a leading Egyptologist. Her passion for Egypt’s ancient monuments, statues, and artefacts never wavered. She overcame what seemed to be insurmountable challenges in convincing countries to donate huge sums of money to rescue the Nubian temple of Abu Simbel from drowning. Had it not been for her persistence and dauntless attitude, Abu Simbel would have drowned upon the completion of the Aswan Dam. Among the many who played a key role in securing funding for the project was Jacqueline Kennedy.

Deroches was instrumental in bringing the treasures of Tutankhamun for tours in the west and for nurturing a fascination for Ancient Egypt among western audiences. Her passion for all things Ancient Egypt was infectious. She spoke of the pharaohs, their wives and children as if they were living entities, sparking enthusiasm in all who heard her. Undeterred by being a lone female in what was then a male-dominated field, Deroches forged ahead, chipping away at obstacles until she achieved her goal of rescuing Ancient Egyptian treasures. She cultivated constructive relations with museum heads and heads of governments. She developed a wonderful rapport with the Egyptian laborers who worked with her on the many archaeological digs, treating them with respect and courtesy, and earning their loyalty.

Olson incorporates a biography of Egypt in the early to mid-twentieth century—its role in WWII, changes in government, the rise of Gamal Abdul Nasser, Suez, and the Arab-Israeli war. She also includes the Louvre’s history and its emergence as a world-class museum. These serve as a backdrop to the narrative, highlighting the many global events against which Deroches had to navigate. Her style is fast-paced and engaging. Her account of transporting the giant monuments at Abu Simbel reads like a thriller, detailing the incredible feat of engineering, the minute calculations required, and the unprecedent level of international cooperation that went into their successful transport to higher ground. She includes some incredible photographs of the removal of the statues and colossi.

Through her extensive and well-documented research, Lynne Olson has brought to life a remarkable, strong-willed, and fascinating woman to whom the world owes a deep debt of gratitude for rescuing some of the world’s most outstanding ancient monuments.

Afterlives

Abdulrazak Gurnah

Afterlives by Abdulrazak Gurnah, the 2021 winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature, explores the impact of colonialism on the identity of the colonized.

The novel is set in Tanzania during the colonial rule of Germany before the first World War and spans about 60 years. It follows the lives of four principal characters through separate threads which intersect and coalesce at the end of the novel. The characters are Khalifa, Ilyas, Afiya (Ilyas’ sister), and Hamza.

It opens with the story of Khalifa, the son of an African mother and Indian father. He begins work with Amur Biashara, a merchant, and later marries Biashara’s niece. His life intersects with an adult Ilyas, a German-speaking African who was sent to a German mission school as a child and worked on a German owned family farm. Ilyas brings his sister, Afiya, to live with him in Khalifa’s house when he learns of her existence. He later volunteers to fight alongside the Germans. He is not heard from, again.

The bulk of the narrative focuses on Hamza, an Askari volunteer who quickly regrets his decision to fight for the Germans. He becomes the personal servant to the Oberleutenant who teaches him German. He is taken to a mission to be treated for the serious injuries experienced in a violent beating. After recovering, he goes home to Zanzibar where he finds employment with Biashara’s son who now runs his father’s company. His co-worker is Khalifa, and the two become friends. He moves in with Khalifa and his wife, falls in love with and marries Afiya. The novel ends in 1963 when Ilyas, the son of Hamza and Afiya, goes to Germany and learns the fate of his uncle.

Woven throughout these threads are historical events—the various uprisings against colonial rule; the brutal reprisals to squash them; the graphic details of Hamza’s life with the German army; the role Christianity plays in advancing the colonial agenda; the events leading up to World War I and its aftermath; World War II; and British colonialism.

This wide scope of colonial history acts as a backdrop since Gurnah is more focused on the many ways in which colonialism impacts his characters. Some manage to carve an existence and livelihood for themselves; others develop a complex relationship with the oppressor, basking in even the slightest display of kindness; while others experience the brutality of colonialism first-hand. But most question their identity and sense of belonging. No one escapes unscathed.

In this sweeping, multigenerational sage, Gurnah is to be commended for exploring the devastating legacy of colonialism on the colonized. His style is straightforward and unemotional. But the abrupt shifts from one protagonist to another are disconcerting. There was too much exposition, too much telling, too much summary, and too little direct dialogue. This creates distance and gives the impression that one is reading a history book rather than a novel. The conclusion is abrupt and hurried, as if Gurnah was in a rush to tie up all the loose ends. In spite of these shortcomings, the novel is recommended because it gives voice to the marginalized and illustrates how the legacy of colonialism is experienced by those who lived through it and those who came after.

So Late in the Day: Stories of Women and Men

Claire Keegan

So Late in the Day: Stories of Women and Men is a collection of three stories by Claire Keegan all of which illustrate manifestations and degrees of male misogynism.

The first story, “So Late in the Day,” recounts a day in the life of Cathal, a Dublin office worker. He is upset, distracted, uncomfortable around people, and avoids interaction. He returns to an empty home because his fiancé has moved out. He flashes back to past interactions with his girlfriend, including his awkward proposal of marriage. But it is not until he flashes even further back in time to an ugly incident at the breakfast table with his parents and sibling that we learn the full extent of his misogyny and, more importantly, where he learned it.

In “The Long and Painful Death” a female writer has been awarded a two-week residency in Henrich Böll’s house on Achill Island. She is looking forward to having uninterrupted time to write. But on her first day, she receives a phone call from a German professor of literature who happens to be standing outside the house. He asks to be allowed in to view the house. Reluctantly, she agrees to his request but asks him to come back in the evening. He arrives at the appointed time, shows little interest in seeing the house, enjoys the refreshments she has provided, and then proceeds to spew verbal venom at her. After he leaves, she turns the unpleasant incident into material for her story.

“Antarctica” is the final and most disturbing story. A married woman wants to experiment by sleeping with a man other than her husband. On a Christmas shopping excursion, she meets a man in a bar and spends the night with him. When she goes back to her hotel room the next morning to collect her bags and catch the train home, he shows up and convinces her to come back to his place with the promise to take her to the train station later. To the reader’s horror, she agrees.

Keegan peppers her stories with clues about her male characters’ misogyny even though the female characters initially excuse them. Cathal’s fiancé forgives his patronizing, demeaning attitude until she’s had enough of his nonsense. The female writer accommodates the male professor’s assumption that he can invade her time and space at his whim. She throws him out when his anger and resentment surface. The married woman, eager to experience an adventure, is completely oblivious to the dangerous situation she has got herself in until it is too late for her to do anything about it.

Keegan is proficient in writing prose that is subtle and spare. She builds up the tension almost imperceptibly. She manages to create an ominous undercurrent in her stories that the reader senses long before her female characters do. Her mastery use of detail serves to contrast women’s expectations of independence and equality with men’s patriarchal expectations of female subservience and compliance. There is a haunting quality about her writing that lingers long after her stories end.

Crossing to Safety

Wallace Stegner

Crossing to Safety by Wallace Stegner is a semi-autobiographical novel about a four decades long friendship of two couples who meet during the Depression. Larry and Sally Morgan have just moved to Madison where Larry is hired to teach in the Department of English at the University of Wisconsin. They meet Sid Lang, also teaching in the Department of English, and his wife, Charity. The two couples bond right away and sustain an enduring friendship.

The narrative unfolds through the first-person voice of Larry Morgan. It opens forty years after their first meeting. Larry and Sally have returned to Battell Pond, the Langs family compound in Vermont where all share many wonderful memories. The Morgans have been summoned there by Charity who is anxious to gather friends, children, and grandchildren for a final grand gesture in the form of a picnic. Predictably, the inexorable force of time has brought about change; things are not as they once were. Charity is dying of cancer; Sally is paralyzed from the waist down having contracted polio. From this opening, Larry circles back to the beginning four decades earlier to describe this life-long friendship. Most of the novel is in the form of an extended flashback. It concludes by circling back to the beginning as Charity is swept off to hospital to die.

As the narrator, Larry assumes the role of an observer. He describes in detail an idyllic life of parties, picnics, late night walks, literary conversations, the challenges of job security in academia, and the logistics of writing. The wealthy Langs with their extended family embrace the Morgans who have no family. They offer support—financial and otherwise—whenever needed. Together, the couples form a community of mutual respect, support, and unconditional love.

Stegner’s writing is vivid and engaging. His attention to detail in describing the flora and fauna of landscape is grounded in an appreciation of the beauty and bounty to be found in nature. His characters are true to life, particularly Charity whose personality and sheer force of will garners most of the attention.

This is a quiet, meditative novel about the vitality and energy of youth; lifelong friendships; aging; coping with health issues; tolerance; compassion; love; loyalty; loss; and the meaning of community. It is about looking back on one’s life through the prism of old age. The novel’s title, taken from a Robert Frost poem, suggests that while time depletes all things, there are certain memories that warm our hearts, that we continue to cherish, and that we absolutely refuse to give up.

The Nakano Thrift Shop

Hiromi Kawakami; trans. Allison Markin Powell

The Nakano Thrift Shop by Hiromi Kawakami, translated from the Japanese by Allison Markin Powell, unfolds in the first-person voice of Hitomi, a young woman who works at the Nakano Thrift Shop.

The narrative is in twelve chapters, with each chapter named after an item that has come through the thrift shop. In addition to describing the items, Hitomi describes the regular patrons; her employer, Mr. Nakano; his sister, Masayo, who frequents the shop on a regular basis; Sakiko, Nakano’s mistress; and Takeo, the thrift shop’s pickup and delivery driver. The chapters are episodic and self-contained. The common thread that runs throughout is the on-again, off-again relationship between Hitomi and Takeo.

The characters, including Hitomi, are all a little quirky. The work environment in the shop is relaxed; the hours, flexible. In spite of the almost familial atmosphere in which employer and employees share meals together, their conversations are stilted as if they are withholding something and are hesitating to speak freely. Their communication stumbles. What is said is by one is seldom understood by others. A paralyzing fear causes them to gravitate toward and away from physical and emotional intimacy. This is particularly evident in the relationship between Hitomi and Takeo. Hitomi scrutinizes and analyzes his gestures, facial expressions, and few spoken words. She harasses him with continuous phone calls to which he doesn’t respond, decides to break it off with him, but then tries to phone him, again. She becomes obsessed with his lack of romantic response even after they have consummated their relationship.

In contrast to the relationships that barely skim the surface, Hitomi describes in granular detail the activities in the shop. She observes and records Mr. Nakano’s mannerisms, speech, and movements in painstaking detail, but she fails to understand him. He remains an enigma. She records the step-by-step process of serving a customer, working the cash register, making and serving tea. She details the appearance and texture of the items entering the shop. She measures the passage of time by describing seasonal changes in the weather. But she fails to understand or communicate openly with the people around her.

The characters don’t evolve or grow and are as static as the objects in the shop. The only action that precipitates a change is when Mr. Nakano decides to sell the shop, and Hitomi and Takeo have to find other means of employment. But when they gather together in the final scene to celebrate Mr. Nakano’s new shop, no amount of wine-drinking can disguise the fact little has changed in the characters. They remain as introverted as ever, taking only halting steps to communicate with one another.

A Council of Dolls

Mona Susan Power

A Council of Dolls by Mona Susan Power is in four sections, with the first three sections moving backward in time. It opens in the 1960s, moves back to the 1930s, then to the 1900s, and concludes in the 2010s. It tells the story of three generations of Dakota women, beginning with Sissy as a young girl in the 1960s and concluding with Sissy/Jesse as a middle-aged woman in the 2010s.

The first three sections unfold in the first-person voice of a young child. In section one, Sissy tells the story of her childhood with a volatile mother. Section two is in the voice of Sissy’s mother, Lillian, as a child. She describes her horrendous experience in a residential school where her sister was poisoned by a nun for publicly asserting her Native American heritage. And section 3 is in the voice of the child Cora, Lillian’s mother. All three sections describe the trauma the girls experienced in a culture that killed their leaders, discriminated against Native Americans, ridiculed and undervalued them, and tried to re-educate them for the purpose of eradicating all traces of their Native American culture and heritage. Separated from their families and all that was familiar, the three young girls cling to their respective dolls for comfort and companionship. The dolls speak to them, encourage them, and help them to endure the psychological trauma of discrimination and indoctrination.

In the final section, Sissy/Jesse retrieves the dolls from various trunks and positions them together to form a council. Each doll comes alive and “speaks” to Jesse, revealing her story and expanding on the background of her mother and grandmother. Jesse writes their stories and, through the process of re-telling their stories, she begins her journey toward healing.

The first three sections work well and depict the horrors inflicted on Native Americans. Power weaves into the narrative some of the stories she heard from her mother and grandmother. The descriptions are graphic and heart-wrenching and they explain the trauma inherited from one generation to the next. The final section, in which the dolls speak to an adult Sissy, seems disconnected from the earlier sections. While it is believable a child can derive comfort by having a doll as an imaginary friend who communicates with her, it is less plausible and somewhat disconcerting when an adult claims to converse with dolls.

Power is to be commended for the unique structure she builds to depict the trauma experienced by Native Americans. Her use of dolls as a device to communicate the innermost thoughts of the girls is effective. Her language is powerful and evocative. The three girls speak in authentic voices that capture the fears, struggles, and confusion they experienced when wrenched from home and family. The final section, which circles back to Sissy, affirms the power of storytelling as a tool of resistance to oppression and as a means to foster healing. Regrettably, this final section is also overly sentimental and contrived.

The Plague

Albert Camus; trans. Stuart Gilbert

Published in 1947, The Plague by Albert Camus, translated by Stuart Gilbert, is a fictionalized account of a virulent epidemic of the bubonic plague consuming the port city of Oran in Algeria.

The narrator, Dr. Bernard Rieux, does not reveal his identity as narrator until the end of the novel. His experience as a physician brings him in close proximity with the living, the dying, and the dead in Oran. An acute observer of events, he charts the initial reluctance of town officials to acknowledge the plague’s presence. They reject his plea to take appropriate measures to mitigate its spread. It is only after deaths surge on a daily basis that the authorities can no longer afford to be in denial or to sugar-coat reality. They acknowledge the seriousness of the epidemic and issue a blockade on the town, implement sanitation procedures, and establish a mandatory curfew.

Camus charts the evolution of the population’s response to the plague—the isolation, the separation from loved ones, the restrictions on movement, and the increasing number of deaths. This is as much a novel about the deaths caused by pestilence as it is a novel about how people react in the face of a prolonged catastrophe with no seeming end in sight. The physical and mental toll is extensive. The drudgery of day-to-day living with little hope is captured. The plague’s invasion of the human body with its bursting buboes and fevers is described in graphic, grisly detail.

Women are given a tangential role in the events. Mothers and wives are briefly depicted mourning for the loss of loved ones. Dr. Rieux’s mother is present but she is always depicted indoors, does not witness the events first-hand, and is there to support her son. Camus focuses exclusively on the plague’s impact on men—government officials, physicians, and Dr. Rieux’s friends and acquaintances.

Amid the exhaustion, the ministering to alleviate suffering, the self-sacrifice of those willing to put their lives at risk to help others, the loss of dignity in death and in burial, and the absurdity of the situation, there emerges the human spirit’s desire to persevere, to show compassion and love, and to continue the struggle regardless of how remote the chance of success may be.

The novel lends itself to an allegorical reading. Dr. Rieux concludes the narrative with a cautionary note: although the plague seems to have abated for now, it can re-appear any time, any place. On the one hand, this is a physical plague that can devastate the human body. On the other, the plague can manifest in forms other than the physical. A plague epidemic can worm its way into our collective psyche, our economy, and our politics. Unlike town officials who are in denial until the plague cements its stranglehold on the community, Camus cautions us to be ever vigilant against its encroachment and to courageously bear witness to its presence. As one of his characters in the novel says, we must battle it even in the face of adversity, calamity, and powerlessness. We must do so because it is the only humanitarian option available to us.

A classic novel that speaks to all people at all times.

The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny, and Murder

David Grann

The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny, and Murder by David Grann is a riveting account of the 1740 British war ship, the Wager. The narrative includes background on prominent members of the crew, the Wager’s journey, the shipwreck, and its aftermath. To retell the story, David Grann combed through manuscripts, archival materials, logbooks, naval records, and journals. He even visited Wager Island to get a feel for the place where the crew was stranded.

The Wager was part of a fleet of British ships that set off for South America to plunder Spanish treasure galleons. Not long into their voyage, the ships encountered rough seas, tempests, raging storms, and giant waves. An outbreak of typhus followed by the scourge of scurvy caused so many deaths that funerals became perfunctory matters consisting of an unceremonious toss into the sea.

The Wager is separated from the rest of the fleet and shipwrecks on an island near the Patagonian coast. The island is inhospitable, offering very little in the way of food. With dwindling rations and emaciated bodies, the castaways become quarrelsome and desperate. Mayhem ensues. Grann charts the bickering that gradually deteriorates into more serious explosive arguments with the men splintering into different factions. Separate camps are set up; orders are disobeyed; there is evidence of cannibalism. Food is stolen, and when the culprits are discovered, they are flogged and abandoned on a separate island to fend for themselves.

Eventually, some of the crew mutiny. They build a makeshift sailing vessel and sail off the island, abandoning the captain and his handful of supporters. Later, the captain and the remaining survivors, including Lord Byron’s grandfather, build their own makeshift sailing vessel and head in the opposite direction. Eventually, first one group of survivors followed by the captain’s group make their way back to England.

With the arrival of the captain, accusations abound of mutiny and murder in conflicting versions of events. Looming over the survivors are threats of imprisonment, court martials, and the possibility of executions. In an attempt to sway public opinion, some of the survivors publish their version to justify their actions. The survival stories capture the imagination of the public, and soon hackers exploit public interest and flood the market with their own versions. Eventually, the survivors are summoned to a trial by court martial. The military opts to bury the events on Wager Island rather than risk exposure of the crew’s behavior as uncivilized, barbaric, and mutinous.

Grann’s skill lies in the graphic, relentless descriptions of the physical and psychological horrors the men experience on land and sea. In no uncertain terms, he depicts the horrendous impact of disease and food deprivation on the crew, and how, when stripped from the trappings of civil society, a people who view themselves as superior beings are transformed into raging barbarians. He argues Britain’s war with Spain had no ulterior motive other than pure greed and exploitation of the valuable resources of the New World and the enslavement of its indigenous population. And, finally, he reminds us the stories empires and nations choose to reveal about themselves may have little to do with truth and everything to do with shaping their activities in a favorable light to influence public opinion.

The Spectator Bird

Wallace Stegner

Winner of the 1977 National Book Award, The Spectator Bird by Wallace Stegner tells the story of seventy-year-old Joe Allston, a retired literary agent. Joe lives in California with Ruth, his wife of many years. This is a character-driven novel unfolding in two alternating time lines.

The narrative opens in the present with Joe and Ruth bickering back and forth. Their lives are jolted when they receive a post card from a friend, a Danish countess named Astrid whom they met twenty years ago when they stayed at her home in Denmark. The post card sends Joe retrieving a three-notebook journal he wrote while in Denmark. Ruth’s insistence that he reads her the journal opens the second time line.

Joe’s back story reveals he harbors considerable guilt. His mother arrived from Denmark at the age of sixteen. She married his father and raised her son single-handedly after his father’s death. Joe recognizes he never fully appreciated her while she was alive or understood her sacrifice. He also harbors guilt for his inability to bond with his son who drowned in a surfing accident. Was it an accident or suicide? he wonders.

As Joe reads the journal, we learn he and Ruth had embarked on the trip to Denmark in an attempt to heal after their son’s death. Joe also wanted to return to his mother’s place of birth to learn something about her past. Their encounter with Astrid and her family triggers shocking revelations and threatens to disrupt their marriage.

The novel unfolds in Joe’s first-person narrative. His interior landscape as well as his conversations with Ruth reveal Joe to be intelligent, self-analytical, extremely well read, eloquent, self-deprecating, delightful, incorrigible, cynical, and utterly charming. As a man in his seventies who is painfully self-conscious of his declining physical abilities, he is a cantankerous, elderly curmudgeon, but he is no less charming.

Stegner’s characters are authentic. Two of the most engaging aspects of the novel are Joe’s realistic voice and his true-to-life relationship with Ruth. Their mutual love and reliance are revealed in their conversations, gentle barbs, and awareness of one other’s foibles. Their ability to communicate without speaking and to read one another’s expressions and moods is an ability shared by many couples who have lived together for decades.

Stegner skillfully captures the fabric of aging and the give and take in the lives of two people who have spent a life time together. Joe and Ruth have grieved together, have faced life’s challenges, are witnessing the illnesses and deaths of close friends, and are struggling daily to cope with the indignities of their aging bodies. They connect with love and companionship. And in Joe Allston, Stegner has created an unforgettable character who revisits his life and the choices he has made. It is only after reading his journal he realizes he has not been a totally passive spectator in his own life. He exercised choice when it mattered most even though his choice may be tinged with regret for the path not taken.

An eloquent, literary tour de force with themes that are as relevant today as they were when it was first published over forty years ago.

Kusamakura

Natsume Soseki; translated by Meredith McKinney

First published in 1906 when Japan was undergoing a major shift into the twentieth century, Kusamakura by Natsume Soseki, translated from the Japanese by Meredith McKinney, is a leisurely book replete with philosophical musings on art, literature, and life and that celebrates a pre-modern, idyllic time.

The unnamed narrator, who self-identifies as an artist, embarks on a walking trip across mountains to stay at a hot spring inn in the remote mountain village of Nakoi. His purpose is to observe and record what he sees and hears with the detached, “nonemotional,” stance adopted by former artists and poets. To achieve this, he tries to erase himself from the picture and be open to absorbing the beauty and rhythm of the natural environment in all its manifest glory. The uninvolved aesthetic response remains paramount in his mind, which, of necessity, requires an avoidance of personal immersion in experience. Accordingly, he shuns emotional involvement, eschewing entanglement with Nami, the beautiful and intriguing daughter of the inn keeper.

Our unnamed artist/poet meanders through the countryside, consciously absorbing its sights and sounds. He pauses to describe the color, appearance, and texture of flora and fauna in minute detail and then verbalizes the emotions they evoke. Images in nature inspire his meditations. Occasionally, he achieves moments of complete peace, which he describes as being “sated with tranquility.” He then ponders how to translate that feeling successfully on canvas so that it is transmitted to the viewer. He expresses himself through bursts of haiku. He is as sensitive to his surroundings as he is to recording the ideas they generate. When climbing up the steps to a Zen monastery, for example, he pauses at each step to register his thoughts and feelings.

In one sense, very little happens in this book. In another sense, it is an intensely moving book replete with meditations on art, poetry, the beauty to be found in nature, and the contrast between the simplicity and traditions of village life with the acquisitiveness and noise of the modern city. The writing is graceful; the language poetic. The translation captures both qualities which, presumably, are present in the original Japanese.

An elegant book to be read slowly and savored.

A Boy of Good Breeding

Miriam Toews

A Boy of Good Breeding by Miriam Toews is a delightfully quirky novel with a motley crew of delightfully quirky characters.

The setting is a small Canadian town. But this is not just any small town. With its fifteen hundred inhabitants, Algren has the notable distinction of being the smallest town in Canada. And Mayor Hosea Funk is anxious to keep it that way. Any less inhabitants would classify it as a village; any more and it would be considered a large town. The mayor has received a letter from Canada’s prime minister notifying him that his town is being considered for an official congratulatory visit from the prime minister on July 1 on condition, of course, that the number of inhabitants remains the same. Hosea Funk anxiously tabulates the births, deaths, and inhabitants leaving or entering town. He desperately wants to meet the prime minister because his mother, Euphemia Funk, announced on her death bed that the prime minister is his father.

The well-meaning, anxiety-ridden Hosea Funk is just one of the quirky characters in this charming little town. There is Knute, a twenty-four-year-old single mother who moves back to town to help take care of her aging father. She has in tow her three-year-old daughter, Summer Feelin’. Summer Feelin’ has the habit of furiously flapping her limbs like a bird when she is excited. Max, Knute’s estranged boyfriend, shows up, determined to make amends and to know his daughter. His mother, Combine Jo, is an alcoholic who drives her combine up and down Main Street, causing a ruckus. There are deaths and births, exits and entrances, all of which are interrupted by the appearance of Bill Quinn, a stray dog who straddles around town as if he owns the place.

This is a novel in which very little happens. What makes the narrative so engaging is Miriam Toews’ ability to take a novel about nothing and turn it into something charming. Her characters are quirky, authentic, and delightful. Somehow, she has us worrying with Hosea about the entrance and exit of each inhabitant. We feel for Knute and Max and want them to get back together to make a family. We sympathize with Gord when his wife, Veronica, takes her newly born triplets and leaves him. And we sympathize with Veronica when she walks out on her husband for giving her little support in raising their existing brood of children. These are believable people, struggling to deal with relationships and struggling to belong.

Miriam Toews paints her characters with all their foibles and idiosyncrasies in gentle, compassionate brush strokes and laugh out loud humor. This is a beautifully written novel with the tender heart that has become the hallmark of Miriam Toews’ books.

Sacred Nature: Restoring our Ancient Bond with the Natural World

Karen Armstrong

In Sacred Nature: Restoring our Ancient Bond with the Natural World, Karen Armstrong aims to rekindle the spiritual connection with nature experienced by our ancient ancestors. In eleven short chapters, she explores the ideas and practices of religious and philosophical texts as guides to facilitate a renewal of our relationship with nature and reverse the damage we have done to our planet.

Armstrong locates our severed relationship with and destructive attitude toward nature to modern European Christianity. She cites European philosophers whose words stripped nature of her sacred, numinous qualities, reducing it a mechanical apparatus that can be dissected, analyzed, and controlled. She argues if we want to save our planet, we need to recapture our original connection with nature and recognize it as an equal and essential partner imbued with spirituality and mystery.

Through copious citations from various religious and philosophical traditions, and with a heavy reliance on Eastern texts, Armstrong harvests concepts that can be applied to our daily lives. Among these are the Golden Rule, cultivating stillness in the presence of nature, Kenosis (an emptying of the self/abandonment of ego), Ahimsa (harmlessness/avoiding injury to all sentient beings), and Gratitude (appreciating/nurturing the beauty, diversity, and balance in nature). Examples taken from the poetry of the British Romantics illustrate the profound impact receptivity to nature can have on our psyche. Each of her chapters concludes with “A Way Forward” to suggest application of these principles in our lives. Notes and an extensive bibliography for further reading are included.

Armstrong is arguing for a complete revisioning of our relationship with one another and with our natural environment. She urges us to embrace spiritual truths that transcend the limits of rationality. She has distilled some perennial insights from major religious and spiritual traditions to make an urgent plea for us to do more to save ourselves and our fragile planet by actively cultivating receptivity to the sacred thread that permeates and connects all forms of life.

Although some may dismiss Armstrong’s interpretations of various religious traditions as skewed and selective, her urgent plea for greater spiritual and personal connection with the natural world should not go unheeded.

The Nightingale

Kristin Hannah

The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah opens in 1995 in Oregon when an elderly woman receives an invitation to attend a celebration in France honoring those who were instrumental in helping others escape from France during the German occupation in WWII. Her connection with the French resistance is suggested but never fully revealed until the end of the novel.

The narrative then shifts to France from the years 1939 to 1945. Two sisters, Vianne and Isabelle, are caught up in the tragedy of war. Vianne’s peaceful existence in her small farm in the Loire Valley is interrupted when her husband is called up to fight the advancing German army. She struggles to survive with her young child, Sophie. Isabelle, an eighteen-year-old firebrand who has been expelled from various finishing schools, joins the French resistance to German occupation. Both girls are estranged from their father.

The threads alternate between Vianne and her experience with the German occupation of her village and Isabelle’s resistance activities. Vianne witnesses the Nazis tightening their stranglehold on the village. She witnesses public executions and deportation of Jews. She sees mothers separated from their children. She experiences harsh winters in threadbare clothes and waits in long queues to obtain what little food there is. Survival is a daily challenge. To make matters worse, she is required to take first one German officer and then a SS officer to billet in her home.

Meanwhile, Isabelle has become increasingly active in the French resistance. Realizing she is putting her sister and niece in grave danger because of her political activities, she moves back to Paris, assumes the code name, ‘Nightingale’, and embarks on the dangerous role of escorting downed allied pilots across the Pyrenees to Spain. Her success attracts the attention of the Nazis who are willing to go to extreme measures to capture the Nightingale.

Throw into the mix various love interests. Vianne loves her husband but then finds herself seriously attracted to Herr Captain Beck, the Wehrmacht officer billeted in her home. And Isabelle, not surprisingly, falls in love with a French revolutionary.

Although the story line is engaging, the novel is more closely affiliated to fantasy than to serious historical fiction. The scenes of sexual tension between men and women are stretched to generate dramatic effect. Cliches abound. The narrative is littered with unrealistic dialogue; one-dimensional, stereotypical characters; exaggerations; gushing sentimentality; improbable coincidences; and highly unlikely chance encounters. At one point, Isabelle encounters a downed RAF pilot in full uniform hiding in a street in Paris. Somehow, he has managed to evade capture in a city that is swarming with Nazis and the SS and, yet, he doesn’t have the wherewithal to hide from a young woman. And when Vianne’s daughter is seriously ill and there’s no medicine to be had anywhere, the Wehrmacht officer billeting in her home hands her some antibiotics which he has, somehow, managed to locate and have in his pocket. And on it goes.

The story line may be engaging, but realistic historical fiction it is not.

The Travelling Cat Chronicles

Hiro Arikawa; trans. by Philip Gabriel

The Travelling Cat Chronicles by Hiro Arikawa, translated from the Japanese by Philip Gabriel, is the story of the enduring friendship between Saturo and his cat, Nano. Nano begins life as a stray cat, but when he is hit by a car, Saturo rescues him, cares for him, and adopts him.

The narrative alternates between third-person point of view, which reveals Saturo’s background and friendships; and first-person point of view, which is in Nano’s voice. Nano reveals himself to be sardonic, opinionated, proud, observant, sarcastic, manipulative, loving, and fiercely loyal. Just as Saturo adopts Nano and is protective over him, Nano reciprocates by being protective and loyal toward Saturo. They communicate with each other and understand one another. But Nano has the advantage of being able to communicate with other animals.

After living together happily for five years, Saturo announces they are going on a car trip across Japan to find a new home for Nano. Saturo had made arrangements with his childhood friends, school friends, and university friends, each of whom has agreed to care for Nano. But an obstacle presents itself with each visit to a friend. This convinces Saturo he cannot leave Nano behind. What he doesn’t know is that Nano has orchestrated the obstacles so he can remain with Saturo. Eventually, the two end up living with Saturo’s aunt who has promised to take care of them during Saturo’s medical treatment. Although hints are dropped throughout about Saturo’s illness, the nature of his illness or its gravity is not revealed until late. The novel’s trajectory and ending are highly predictable.

This is a story about compassion, loyalty, friendship, loss, and grief. It is about the role four-legged friends can play in assuaging loneliness. It is about reciprocity and companionship. It uses simplistic language, which may or may not be due to the translation, and it a quick and easy read. Although the novel has heart and may be a tear-jerker for some, others may feel it lacks substance and depth.

The Promise

Damon Galgut

Winner of the 2021 Booker Prize, The Promise by Damon Galgut is a family saga of the Afrikaner Swart family in South Africa. Beginning in 1986 and spanning four decades, it is set against the backdrop of a changing South Africa. The novel opens with the death of the matriarch, Rachel Swart. Rachel is survived by her husband, Manie, and their three children, Anton, Astrid, and Amor. Before her death, Rachel extracts a promise from Manie that he will bequeath a small homestead on their property to Salome, their black housekeeper. The promise is witnessed by Amor, a young child at the time.

Upon her mother’s death, Amor reminds her father of his promise. He denies making it. As the decades unfold, Amor is haunted by the unfulfilled promise. She reminds her siblings of the promise after their father’s death; she reminds Anton of the promise after Astrid’s death. Anton assures her he will honor the promise, but he never does. It is only after his death when Amor inherits the property is she able to honor her mother’s wishes and legally transfer the homestead to Salome. By this time, Salome is an elderly woman and the property is virtually worthless.

The novel is in four parts, beginning with the death of Rachel followed by the deaths of Manie, Astrid, and Anton in that order. Each of the four sections focuses on one family member, and each section includes a death and a funeral. The characters are skillfully portrayed, unveiling more of themselves as the years unwind. In voices that are unique and authentic, their interiority reveals them to be tortured, fractured souls.

From the outset, the Swarts are depicted as dysfunctional and non-communicative. They don’t know how to express or feel love for one another. Manie is alienated from his wife and children; Anton is a military deserter, a failed novelist, and an alcoholic; Astrid is a self-absorbed, status-conscious housewife; and Amor is the quiet, aloof, and unobtrusive loner. Their downward spiral and unravelling begin with Rachel’s death and the unfulfilled promise to Salome. As such, the family can be viewed as a microcosm of South African society with its fractured white minority subjugating and betraying a non-white majority with false hopes and broken promises.

The story is compelling, but the real strength of the novel lies in the agility of the narrative voice. The narrator shifts seamlessly, often in mid-sentence and mid-paragraph, between characters, points of view, dialogue, and interiority. Occasional direct addresses to the reader pepper the narrative with unflinching honesty and commentary. Their effect is to generate a feeling of immediacy—of actually being there and witnessing the events. These intrusions are sometimes dark; sometimes hilarious; sometimes sarcastic; sometimes irreverent; sometimes accusatory; sometimes ironic; sometimes playful; sometimes self-conscious; sometimes self-deprecating; but always, always engaging.

A cleverly-executed and compelling novel, well-deserving of its award.