Incendiary

I'm sorry it's been a while since I last wrote - school's been soo hectic!

At the moment, I'm reading Little Bee, by Chris Cleave, which is a current fiction best seller. Not too long ago I read another book of his, Incendiary. Incendiary is written in letters - letters to Osama bin Laden. In the story, the protagonist is a British woman, trying to cope with loss after an enormous terrorist attack.

It actually took me several chapters to realize that the attack the woman refers to is a fictional one. In the story, Al Queda terrorists set off a series of bombs in Chelsea stadium, during a Chelsea vs Arsenal soccer match that her son and husband were attending. As you can imagine, the story is not light and amusing, though it is rather witty. Through the eyes of a working class woman with "bad nerves" who lacks any understanding of comma usage, we see what happens when things begin to fall apart - or explode, as it were - around our ears. As London disintegrates into lunacy, so does the protagonist, though there is a prevailing ray of hope that things may return to normalcy. Whether it's a happy or sad ending, I won't reveal, but I do want to warn you that after the tragedy and horror of the book as a whole, not even a "happily ever after" could leave you feeling warm and fuzzy.

This relatively adult book is tragic, poignant and rather critical of the human race. It's terribly well-written, and the bad grammar, punctuation and capitalization only add to it's unique appeal. I have very little criticism for this fabulous book by Chris Cleave, and enjoyed the fact that it didn't seem to have great political biases or leanings, despite the politically-touchy nature of the subject matter. It's a sort of worst-case-scenario that is so fascinating, and told by such an appealing character, that it will pull you in to the plot, and probably make you cry as often as it makes you laugh.

I'll share what I think of Little Bee, as soon as I finish it - it too takes place in the modern day UK and the protagonist is also a woman who's suffered a great deal.. so far, I love it!

Happy Reading!

Edna St. Vincent Millay: Feast

I drank at every vine.
The last was like the first.
I came upon no wine
So wonderful as thirst.

I gnawed at every root.
I ate of every plant.
I came upon no fruit
So wonderful as want.

Feed the grape and bean
To the vintner and monger;
I will lie down lean
With my thirst and my hunger.

I haven't written about a poem yet, but I was recently reading a collection of poetry by Edna St. Vincent Millay and it was all so delectable, I wanted to write about it. Millay is a fabulous poet who wrote about love and life - sometime flippantly, sometimes dramatically, sometimes cynically. This poem is too self-explanatory for me to say much about it; I just think she's a brilliant writer who says simple things in her poetry that others don't often think to say. Also, she has a way of romanticizing a life of dissatisfaction and recklessness, without ignoring the negative aspects.

A few recomendations of beautiful poetry of hers:

Sad:
The Betrothal
Ebb
Ashes of Life
Spring
Time Does Not Bring Relief/Sonnet II

Optomistic:
To A Young Poet
First Fig
Second Fig
Recuerdo

Books To Read

I just found a list of books that I read last year in my room, and I thought I'd share my favorites. I'll divide them up - books for adults, books for kids, books for teenagers, and books for anyone.

Some of the Books for Kids are more boy-oriented, since I borrowed most of them from my little brother when I ran out of books to read, but I enjoyed most of them anyway. I enjoy a very wide range of literature, so I'd recommend reading the backs of these books before starting them. Also, these are all books I read over 6 months ago, so I apologize if I forgot to mark any with an M or D. Let me know if you read/enjoy any of these!

Key:
(M) m for mature; books that have more than a little drugs/sex in them, as I remember
(D) d for disturbing; don't take it too seriously, but these are books with themes like suicide, abuse, and mental illness
* one of my favorites


Books For Kids (10-13):

Lion Boy Trilogy
Aleutian Sparrow
Airman
Wolf Brother
Downsiders
The Last Codfish
Anahita's Woven Riddle (more of a girl book)
The Life History of A Star (also a girl book)
Elske (definitely a girl book - princesses and all)


Books for Teenagers:

Margaux with an X
As Cool As I Am (M)
The Torn Skirt (M)
A Simple As Snow
Ely & Naomi's No Kiss List
Keeping You A Secret
Burned (D) *
Wide Awake
The Realm of Possibility
48 Shades of Brown
Cupcake
Confess-O-Rama
Playing with Matches
Crooked*
You Know Where to Find Me (M) (D)
Marly's Ghost
Perks of Being a Wallflower (D)
It's Kind of A Funny Story (D) *
All That Remains (D)*
The Bean Trees
Stealing Henry
Chasing Windmills
The Arizona Kid
Boy Meets Boy
Dough Boy
Beige
Things My Mother Doesn't Know
Looking For Alaska (D)(M)*
After the Crash, I Picked Myself Up, Spread My Wings, and Flew Away (D)(M)
The Fattening Hut (D)
The Pretty One
Life Is Funny (M)
Wild Orchid
I Can't Tell You (M?)


Books for Adults:

Sea Wolf
Images of Chekov (Russian literature - not exactly cheery)
The Bluest Eye (M)(D)
The Guardian
Joy In the Morning


Books for Anyone (adults/teens):

Crashing Through
Gone With the Wind*
A Thousand Splendid Suns (D)(M)
1984


After going through this list, I realize that there are plenty of books I didn't like at all, so I didn't include those. I apologize for the lack of authors, but if you search these titles on Amazon.com or at a library, you can probably find all of them. Happy reading!

Ali and Nino

The title of this book by Kurban Said says a lot. The two names are the names of lovers, like Tristan and Isolde, or Romeo and Juliet. And like Ali Babba and the Forty Thieves, this story takes place in the Middle East.

Just before the first world war, two young people in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan, fall in love. Ali is a Muslim boy of aristocratic descent. Nino is a Christian girl with Western values, yet the two share a deep bond from the first. Even as a school boy, Ali thinks Nino is the most beautiful girl in the world. From the very first chapter, the question is raised: is Baku in Europe, or Asia? As the city struggles with its identity, so do the lovers. Ali feels at home in a Persian palace, while Nino refuses to wear a veil. Ali's ancestors killed Nino's namesake's husband. As Ali says, "We ought to be blood enemies."

In the end, though, the two are seperated by death, not by religion or beliefs or culture. This book explores the controversies that accompany love when the lovers have different ideas about religion and social rules. Is it possible to have a deep, spiritual bond with someone who practices a different religion and values different ideas? Is it possible to have a lover or spouse whose cultural ideas about love and marriage are very different? In Ali and Nino, the it does seem possible. Yet they are rarely happy at the same time, and since they share such a deep bond, this means that for most of the story they are both unhappy. So while Said seems to idealize love that overcomes cultural boundaries, he also portrays it as an unhappy struggle. Thus, the romantic message has a stipulation: love can overcome anything, but it'll probably leave everyone miserable if it has to overcome much of anything.

One thing that Said does very well is characterization; unlike some authors, who rush to tell us exactly who all of the characters are, he slowly reveals them. In real life, we rarely know who anyone truly is, and we learn about them slowly if at all. If you've read A Tale of Two Cities, you know that Dickens rushes to tell us everything about a character: what they look like, what they wear, what distinct mannerisms, habits, and idiosyncracies they have, and everything else that usually takes time to notice about a person. Said lets each character slowly tell the reader who they are through actions and dialogue, often with many contradictions and changes along the way. This is appropriate for a novel that deals with a crisis of identity for a city and for two people.

This book can be read as an entertaining romance, or a thought-provoking commentary on culture, religion, and human nature. It examines issues that divide the world today, and is a beautiful love story.

The Old Man and the Sea

I recently began writing a piece for a short story contest, on the topic of "the human condition". For my piece, I chose the theme of the human cycle of insecurity, rejection, anger, and guilt. The prompt, however, made me think of another story of the human condition.

In The Old Man and the Sea, Santiago is an elderly fisherman who catches an enormous fish. It takes a great deal of time to fight and kill it, and as he tows it back to the shore (he cannot lift it into his boat) a shark eats most of the fish. This tragic man-vs-nature struggle is such a human story. Alone in a dangerous wilderness, we fight to survive. Sometimes we succeed. But if our story seems to have a happy ending, it is because it is not finished. Had Hemingway finished the story right when the old man triumphed over the great fish, it would have been a happy ending. Like life, however, Hemingway continued on until the triumph turned into a great defeat, and the old man returned to his simple life, weary and sad.

Hemingway explored the beauty of true competition in this story, and the crushing frustration of unfair defeat. The experienced fisherman and the 18-foot sword fish, both old and cunning and strong, fight a fair battle. But as it fights, the fish swims farther and farther from shore, bringing the old man with it. Thus, once it dies, the old man has days of sailing to get back. And in these days, a swarm of sharks find him and follow him and attack. They attack together, and at night, like the most dispicable cowards, but they are only animals, which adds to the indignity of the situation. In the end, Santiago returns to his worried village, where people fuss over the enormous skeleton still tied to his boat, and he goes to sleep and dreams of the same things he dreamed of before he left.

I love this approach to writing, because so many authors make it seems as though the characters have undergone some great change and life is linear, when actually people rarely change and life is a cyclical pattern. This story is a fanciful creation, yet strikingly true.

The Disreputable History of Frankie-Landau Banks

This book seems, at first, like one of those silly Gossip Girl-type books where everyone is wealthy, and the main character suddenly becomes popular when she becomes pretty. Actually, though, it's a book about society's expectations, feminism, and being underestimated.

The main character's name is Frankie-Landau Banks, and she attends a fancy East Coast prep school where mostly everyone is smart and wealthy. She isn't exactly a feminist, but she is very bothered by the fact that everyone in her life underestimates her. Her family calls her "bunny-rabbit", and no one notices her until she goes up a few bra-sizes.

Once that happens, though, all of the guys suddenly notice her, and the most popular guy in school asks her out. They still don't take her seriously, though. The author explains how Frankie wants to be "a force to be reckoned with," and she does this by infiltrating the all-male Basset Hound Society, an old and secretive society of the most popular upperclassmen at her prep school, of which her boyfriend is president. Once she realizes that secrets are being kept from her, and that she is second fiddle to her boyfriend's friends, she becomes determined to prove all of the low expectations wrong. She succeeds in her efforts, and everyone realizes that she matters. Naturally, though, her boyfriend holds this against her, and she suddenly is left with only her nerdy best friend as a social circle.

The author, E. Lockhart, clearly sets forth a societal conflict: can a woman be successful and popular? Frankie is beautiful, smart, wealthy, charming, and generally a nice person, yet is hated as soon as she outsmarts a few people. She constantly compares herself to guys, wants to beat them at things and have what they have, but also wants them to want her. It seems reasonable to want respect and love from people at the same time, but Frankie's situation is a common one in life. I'll say right of the bat that I don't know anything about politics or politicians, but I find it offensive that Hillary Clinton, when running for a presidential election, was mocked for things like lipstick choices and her appearance. Michelle Obama is a smart, accomplished person who is important in many ways, yet the public is fixated on her shapely arms and cute dresses. This sort of thing is exactly what Frankie stands up against; if you are going to admire someone, admire them for who they are, not what they look like. And if you're going to criticize a politician, you had better have something against her other than her gender.

This book is relatively simple in message: if you're a girl, don't be a doormat. Whoever you are, don't underestimate girls. If you can't join 'em, beat 'em, but if you succeed you will definitely not be able to join 'em.

Book Four - The Geography Club

I'm on the fence on this one, to be honest. I've got opinions, but they don't add up to a definitive Yes or No.

The Geography Club, by Bret Hartinger, is about a young man who is gay and finds several other non-straight friends. He finds out that his best friend is bisexual, and has a lesbian girlfriend, and that the popular guy at school is not only gay, but has a crush on him. They are all struggling with their identities in a small town where the unpopular kid is ridiculed for being gay (he's not) and everyone is horrified by the idea of a gay-straight alliance. So the kids form a club, but they call it Geography Club. They all say they're doing it for college, to beef up their resumes, and no one asks too many questions. Naturally, various issues come along, friendships (and other relationships) are tried, and some fail.

The things I loved about this book were the characters and the emotions. Russel Middlebrook, the main character, is like a cross between Bella (from the Twilight series) and one of John Green's male protagonists. He's a normal highschool kid, sweet and smart and somewhat funny. Hartinger does a beautiful job of describing romantic moments from Russel's point of view, but doesn't make him sound like a girl. This tricky balance between feminine and masculine was well done, I thought. Same with the emotional bits; Russel's insightful enough that the reader feels included, but there's enough plot and dialogue that we aren't just looking at the story from inside his head.

The issue I had was with the portrayal of American high school. There are so many books and movies that make it look like a viscious jungle, where anyone heavy or gay or book smart is an outcast, and generally treated cruelly. I know that there are places where this is the case, but I have a hard time relating. At my school, there are nerd and fat kids at all levels of the social ladder, if there even is a social ladder (my opinion on that changes regularly). As far as gay/lesbian/bisexual kids, there are a couple stereotypical gay guys who act and sing and dress well, and a couple girls who go around telling everyone that they're lesbian or bisexual, but that's about it. No one see's The Outcast getting bullied every day at lunch, and people join the Gay-Straight Alliance if they think it'll look good for college. There is not so much drama surrounding status, with jocks on the top and various minorities at the bottom. It's hard to say, though, whether other schools are as bad as the one in The Geography Club. I really wouldn't know.

So what do you think? Read it, and get back... or just comment based on what I've written. This is another good one for school stuff, since you can easily discuss things like stereotypes and the message, and it doesn't take long to read!