The Hunger Games

Suzanne Collins' futuristic trilogy begins with The Hunger Games, which I grabbed from the library without knowing what I was getting myself into. I was expecting some kind of romantic crap, but what I got was an exciting tale of a gladiator-esque fight to the death blended with a Romeo and Juliet style romance. Fabulous surprise!

In a literary world glutted with horrible fantasy books, (I'm looking at you Twilight), The Hunger Games stands out as a post apocalyptic beauty. The basic premise is that North America has been split into 12 districts and each of these districts sacrifices two teens to the Hunger Games each year. At the Hunger Games, the kids fight to the death and the winner lives in eternal glory and brings a bit of wealth back to their suffering district. Of course, our protagonist, a gal named Katniss, is from a poor, disadvantaged district, but she's spunky and resourceful. She is thrown into the arena to fend for herself against 23 other competitors. Will she turn into a savage killer? Will she win the favor of the crowds watching the competition on TV? Will she survive to see her family?

Oh, you'll have to read it to find out. The book is geared toward teenagers and it has a pretty straightforward, accessible style. Unlike some of my previous nerd-cred books, this one is pure brain fluff, designed perfectly to add some sweetness to your zombie's diet.

Highly recommend it for a quick, easy read.

Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything

Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner's bestseller, Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything, is one of the more entertaining and worthwhile non-fiction, non-history books that I've ever had the pleasure of reading. While I rarely gush about books, this one is a real winner--provocative, well-written, interesting and in the end, it made me smarter for having read it. Gotta keep my brain plump for the zombies, you know.

Levitt and Dubner confess early on that their book has no unifying theme, save for the promise that it will ask questions of data sets that are typically left unasked. For example, they question whether or not high stakes testing will increase incidents of teachers cheating to improve scores and how mining test score data can help detect who cheats and who doesn't. It may not sound riveting, but reading it is as good as debating a whodunnit in Law and Order. Perhaps that's the genius of this book. It takes prurient questions--how much incentive does your real estate agent have to get you the very best price on your house?--and asks hard data to reveal the answers.

This is one of the best books I've read for awhile. I highly recommend it.

Over the Edge of the World: Magellan's Terrifying Circumnavigation of the World

Laurence Bergreen's gorgeously researched book, Over the Edge of the World: Magellan's Terrifying Circumnavigation of the Globe, is an entertaining Age of Discovery history that blends rapturous discovery, paternalistic interaction with native cultures, disease, hardship and political machinations into a dramatic tale of exploration and death. A dear friend of mine turned me on to naval history books like Nathaniel Philbrick's winner, In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex and I've been hooked since.

Bergreen's book tackles how Magellan's fleet became the first to circumnavigate the world despite multiple mutinies, Spanish-Inquisition-style punishments, scurvy, storms, improper maps and hostile enemies. He uses primary sources like captain's logs to piece together what happened, including an insightful account of the God-complex that ultimately led to Magellan's death as he attempted to force Christian conversion on an unwilling native culture and ended up hacked to bits for his trouble. Bergreen explores the motivation of the sailors aboard the ship and he explains how a fleet of five ships and more than 200 men set off...and a crippled ship with a skeleton crew of 18 returned.

I loved this book both for the actual reading enjoyment and for the high brow nerd factor. Though, between the two, I might say read In the Heart of the Sea first. It's been years since I read that one and I still recall the experience of reading it fondly.

We're Just Like You Only Prettier: Confessions of a Tarnished Southern Belle

Celia Rivenbark's book, We're Just Like You, Only Prettier: Confessions of a Tarnished Southern Belle, reads a bit like a Jeff Foxworthy comedy sketch, only less funny, less polished and less endearing. Rivenbark tackles some different territory, like the insecurity mothers feel creeping around the edges when someone asks our kid what they had for breakfast and the answer is a cookie instead of steel-cut oatmeal with organic fruit.

The book's strength lies in those few, brief moments when Rivenbark manages to meld satire with a larger note that rings true for many female readers. I think this book would fall woefully flat for men or childless women. There are a few humorous observations anyone can enjoy like her reflection on the way politicians will talk about girls, booze and casual sex as an ice breaker for more substantive policy discussion as if hungover college students groggily recalling their latest hookups want to chat about school reform. But there are other moments like the agony of marathon dance recitals that may seem dull or beyond the realm of common experience for some readers.

The book loses steam about halfway through and Rivenbark's wit gives way to some tedious reading that forcibly reminded me of sitting at The Comedy Store in Los Angeles while a struggling comedian awkwardly stumbled through a poor set of jokes while the audience laughed uncomfortably, desperately waiting for the kid to take his final bow. That being said, it's an easy read with some very entertaining moments and a bit of mindless slog. If you're looking for a laugh, I'd read Sh*t My Dad Saysfirst.

The Geography of Bliss

Another $.25 rummage sale buy, Eric Weiner's The Geography of Bliss: One Grump's Search for the Happiest Places in the World, tantalized me enough with the title that I decided to read it, being both a grump and an occasional misanthrope. Half travelogue, half study of happiness, I found that I didn't think the book did either particularly well.

Weiner, an NPR foreign correspondent, divides the book into ten countries that each illuminate some aspect of the eternal quest for happiness, be it the entrenched misery of Moldova or the promoted happiness of Bhutan. He asks provocative questions, like how do we quantify happiness or does the simple act of defining happiness make us less happy? Can a culture breed unhappiness? Can it create happiness? Does social and financial inequality create unhappiness? Does equality create happiness? If you've ever wanted to think about happiness on a policy scale, here's the book for you.

I guess I'd say the book is worth reading, but if you could only read one novel the entire year, this one would stay dusty on the shelf a little while longer.

The Other Boleyn Girl

Yet another rummage sale purchase that found its way onto my bookshelf, Philippa Gregory's The Other Boleyn Girl is a long, but entertaining foray into historical fiction and the twisted relationship of two sisters caught between the sheets of a cold-blooded, impulsive king. If that description doesn't make you want to pick up this scintillating tale, there's also a film version starring Natalie Portman awaiting you.

Gregory allows the youngest of the Boleyn trio, Mary, to narrate the tale as the most sympathetic of the siblings brought to court by an ambitious uncle to improve the family fortune. Ushered to the King's bed at 14, Mary soon loses his favor to her more avaricious sister, Anne, who plots a clumsy Machiavellian scheme to unseat the King's current wife and usher in her own reign as Queen of England. As we all know, the scheme falls flat when Anne fails to birth a son and is eventually beheaded along with anyone else the King didn't particularly like.

Gregory executes the plot brilliantly and the arc of this story is artful, intelligent and provocative. I had trouble putting it down. Another recommendation to keep your brain plump and wrinkly for the zombies.

Sh*t My Dad Says

Justin Halpern's book, Sh*t My Dad Says, is a compilation of hilarious quotes from his foul-mouthed father first made famous by Halpern's popular twitter account. Interspersed with bawdy quotes are somewhat touching and heartfelt narratives about Halpern's childhood and his father's caustic advice as he stumbles through the adult minefields of romance and the working world. This short book is ideal for bathroom reading and so long as you're not the prudish, easily-offended-by-profanity type, it's entertaining, as far as mindless fluff goes.

Me Talk Pretty One Day

David Sedaris' most popular book, Me Talk Pretty One Day, is well worth picking up for a gander. Split into halves, the first collection of essays deals with Sedaris' childhood and 20-something stumblings and the second half explores his move to France with his partner, Hugh. Both sections examine Sedaris' literal and figurative struggle to find a voice, as a lisping homosexual in the South and as a bumbling American transplant with mediocre French in Normandy.

As always, Sedaris' charm lays in his ability to take everyday experiences, like the misery of childhood speech pathology classes or the awkward enthusiasm of a parent for music lessons, and mold it into an amusing anecdote with the capacity to draw laughter from his text. I find Sedaris' dry humor incredibly entertaining and engaging though some criticize him for being negative. He can occasionally be a bit high-brow and I think that upper-middle class readers may enjoy his work more than the less epicurian reader.

At any rate, I highly recommend reading at least one of Sedaris' books. He's one of the best American humorists of our time and he manages it without resorting to a crassness that makes you feel tarnished when you're done.

When You Are Engulfed in Flame

So I recently had the pleasure of discovering David Sedaris when I picked up When You Are Engulfed in Flames at a rummage sale for $.25. Sedaris, an American humorist whose books have sold more than 7 million copies worldwide, makes his living by observing every day phenomena with a dry wit and sardonic humor that enliven common experiences like air travel.

In his seventh published work, Sedaris takes on the stunning horrors of middle age and the realization of his own impending mortality. He tackles everything from quitting smoking, to the mundane but comforting rhythms of long-term relationships, to the indignities of ass boils. The fact that Sedaris has sold so many books should tell you that he does all of this in a snarky, funny way that makes him a worthy cultural observer. His position as a tongue-in-cheek chronicler of our time is made all the more unique as he's an unabashedly gay man and naturally, writes from his perspective as such.

I enjoyed Sedaris' work primarily for his voice, though if you only have a chance to read one of his books, I would recommend Me Talk Pretty One Day, which I review here.

The Help

Kathryn Stockett's The Help is well worth reading though I hesitate to worship it like some reviewers have. The tale is thought-provoking, entertaining and it encourages deeper contemplation of the complex racial relationships of Southern women that form a painful and very real chapter of our history. And really, what more do you want from a book than to be entertained and provoked?

The Help follows a wealthy Southern white woman, Skeeter, as she pursues her unusual dream of becoming a journalist. She decides to catch the attention of NYC publishers by writing about the help, the black women who spend their lives attending to the needs of white women. Stockett does an excellent job of portraying both the intense racism of the era and the genuine bonds between white women and their black help. Without being overly preachy, she manages to capture the affection black help had for the kids they nannied and occasionally, for the women they worked for.

The story follows Skeeter as she strives to give black women a voice through her writing (a facet of the story that bothers me a bit, as if black women need a white helper to have a meaningful voice). Skeeter struggles to find women to speak until the Civil Rights Movement heats up and suddenly, black woman want to be heard. And the stories they tell are honest, horrifying, funny and sad. It's incredibly difficult to write a book like this without being callous to one side or the other but Stockett manages to humanize everyone without softening the ugliness, pain or degradation of oppression. It's excellent.

It's also an easy read, great for a lazy rainy afternoon or a few days at the beach.

The Postmistress

I had high hopes for The Postmistress by Sarah Blake and they were utterly destroyed by actually reading the book. There's nothing worse than picking up a hyped piece of literature only to discover that it more closely resembles the giant dump you left in the porcelain pot this morning.

I think the reason I truly detest The Postmistress is that it had so much potential to be great and instead, it fell flat. The story traces the lives of three women--a journalist named Frankie, a doctor's wife named Emma and a postmistress named Iris--in a small town just before the US becomes active in WWII. The plot is clumsily contrived to bring the three women together. Emma arrives in Franklin on the same bus as Iris and starts a great life with her doctor husband. Soon after conceiving her first child, her husband loses a woman in childbirth, is traumatized and decides to go off to London to help victims of the German bombings. He's unaware that Emma is pregnant. While he's there, he meets up with Frankie who witnesses his tragic, meaningless death. Frankie becomes the keeper of a letter for Emma and she eventually decides to got to Franklin to deliver it. In the meantime, the doctor had left Iris with a letter for Emma in case he was killed in London. Iris intercepts a letter for Emma that suggests her husband was killed. But both Iris and Frankie tiptoe around the issue of the doctor's death until a telegram comes officially bearing the bad news. The end.

As I said, it's a plot tortured from the surroundings, entirely artificial and fairly tedious to get through. After finishing the book, I felt cheated out of a good story. The backdrop of WWII is so inherently dramatic that intrigue, suspense and emotion should ooze out of a story like this. Instead, Blake takes a fascinating backdrop and clogs it with the tale of a housewife sitting at home, twiddling her thumbs, waiting for news. If I wanted to read about bored, pregnant ladies irrationally bitter that their husbands are at work, I'd write an autobiography.

The story awkwardly jumps from wartime Europe to an America gearing up for war and the rest of the plot isn't strong enough to prevent the whiplash from that transition. The characters aren't particularly compelling or well developed. Blake has potential to be a great writer. This attempt fell far short of great and it's doomed to be forgotten within a year or two.

Cutting For Stone

Abraham Verghese's Cutting for Stone is a physician's wet dream of an epic, a tale of twin brothers raised by doctors in a missionary hospital in Ethiopia. Don't let the dramatic setting dissuade you from picking up this book. It's really a story about passion, shame, ambition and sex and the consequences of actions driven by such intense emotions.

Cutting For Stone opens with a nun and a surgeon who share their denial of a love affair that evolves in the operating theater and is consummated in a fiery lust that produces twin boys, conjoined at the head. The nun dies in childbirth and the father flees to America, unable to come to terms with his inability to save his lover, with the gruesome reality that he was willing and able to kill his children in a desperate bid to save her.

But he doesn't kill the boys. They survive and are adopted by another doctor couple whose love blooms under the stress and strain of parenting twin boys. The story follows the tale of one brother, Marion, as he matures in the politically unstable Ethiopian environment, as he falls in love and his brother crassly fucks the girl of his dreams. That betrayal eventually prompts Marion to leave Ethiopia for the US so he can pursue his dream of becoming a doctor. And while he's in the states, his lover reappears, fucks him and gives him an STD that nearly kills him.

There's an excellent twist in the tale that I won't reveal here that makes the last 150 pages fly by. It's a fabulous read, made more excellent by the time and care Verghese takes in developing his characters and allowing significant moments of their lives to unfold in a patient and deliberate way. The arch of the story is beautifully constructed and expertly executed to maximize reading pleasure. This is one of the best books I've read in a very long time.

I highly recommend it.