The Winter Queen

Book 3 of the Russian Reading Challenge: Boris Akunin's The Winter Queen, the first in a series of mysteries set in the final decades of the 19th century. Akunin started publishing in Russia about 10 years ago, and gained massive popularity in a hurry, and TWQ first appeared in English in 2003. (At least a half dozen other Akunin titles are also available in translation.)

The book's protagonist is Erast Fandorin, a very young clerk in the Moscow police department. He is eager and curious, traits that lead him to investigate a simple suicide that proves to be anything but. The mystery has a variety of twists and discoveries, and while it's not particularly challenging, it is awfully fun. (I'd like to hear what others think of the ending though.)

A couple other aspects of the novel that I found noteworthy:
The suicide is a case of "American roulette," better known to most of us as Russian, and it prompted this observation by a rakish count: "It's stupid but exciting. A shame the Americans thought of it before we did." This led me to wonder about the origins of the term, and mini-research (Wikipedia, of course - and in Russian) suggests that Akunin is alone on the American origin thing, although there doesn't seem to be much evidence attaching it to Russia either. But it was still funny to me. (Also, a similar game of chance with gunplay is mentioned in Lermontov's A Hero of our Time - per Wiki the only instance of R.R. in Russian literature - but it's hard to call it quite the same thing, upon rereading the story.)

Aspects of the characters reminded me a great deal of Dostoevsky, particularly The Idiot, although also Bros. K. Fandorin has a shade of Myshkin-esque innocence to him, and he is also drawn to two distinct types of beauties. One is pure and fair, and of good family; the other is dark, corrupted, but utterly beguiling. And the latter has a train of roguish followers. Maybe I'm making too much of it though.

All in all though, an excellent challenge selection.

crossposted at RRC

Mmm, history...

My first week as a grad student, Prof. K assigned both Herodotus and Thucydides for us to read and come back to discuss the next week. (Um, right. So I made it about 1/3 to 1/2 through each. Isn't 600 pages for one class as a baby grad student enough???) And then school got crazy - and then I left - and I've never finished reading them. I want to though! And after reading Daniel Mendelsohn's recent New Yorker article on Herodotus I might even find the wherewithal to do so.

First off, most awesome depiction of H ever: he was "like having an embarrassing parent along on a family vacation. All you wanted to do was put some distance between yourself and him, loaded down as he was with his guidebooks, the old Brownie camera, the gimcrack souvenirs—and, of course, that flowered polyester shirt." (Mendelsohn and co. originally preferred Thucydides. I, on the other hand, hate all that on vacations but LOVE it in my histories.)

Anyway, the article is awesome; it makes me want to go back to the books soon soon soon, and even compares H's style to that of "War & Peace" and the events covered to America's current escapades in the Middle East. So look for some ancient history coming to this blog sometime this summer...

Confessions of a Chick-Lit Reader

I can't help myself. Recently I compiled a list of ideas for my book club's upcoming meeting. Included on the list was Sophie Kinsella's Confessions of a Shopaholic, a book I never really expected to read but somehow ended up owning. The rest of the members totally did not go for it (they chose Candide instead) but I actually think that we could have had a very interesting discussion from Kinsella.

On Saturday afternoon I was feeling tired and grumpy and wanted a quick pick-me-up of a read. So I grabbed COAS and got started. I finished it sometime around 8:30 that evening before getting ready to go to a party (I had to stop for the Stanley Cup finals, else I might have finished earlier) and I must say that it absolutely filled my need. Kinsella took a lot from Bridget Jones' Diary, and I'm pretty sure I had mapped out the plot within about 5 pages, but sometimes that's okay. Becky's disconnect between her lack of money and inability to stop spending is adorable - and unfortunately all too relevant to me these days, although clearly I should aim higher. More biting though, is Kinsella's attention to the way the financial industry helps her along in this self-delusion, offering her new lines of credit even as they are sending her collection letters. That I enjoyed.

Anyway, for all my ridiculous vocabulary and big important books, I still am a sucker for chick lit. And I'm a sucker for all the same reasons other "chicks" are: it is light and funny; we recognize our own foibles in the person of the protagonist; despite those foibles, life and love always work out in the end; and said protagonist is always just that much more interesting and sophisticated than we are. We can aspire to be her, because she made it there even though she is neurotic, or a spendthrift, or has wacky parents, or can't hold down a job.

Are these books good for our psyche, or just empty calories? Probably the latter, but sometimes you need the empty calories. Because what is life if you always make the wise decision?

A Happy e-mail in my inbox

Good news

I am thrilled to inform you that we have successfully restored $1.5
million in funding to our City’s public libraries. We will now be
able to buy new books to fill library shelves and keep regional library
branches opened on Sundays.

As Vice-Chair of the Los Angeles Budget and Finance Committee I was
honored to fight for one of our City’s most valued resources, our
libraries. But we could not have achieved this victory without the
impressive outpouring of community support to restore funds. I received
hundreds of emails, phone calls and letters expressing concern about the
proposed funding cuts. I thank you for your commitment to keeping our
treasured libraries open and available to all our residents. I look
forward to hearing from you again soon.

Sincerely,

Councilwoman Wendy Greuel
Second Council District

Mary Poppins wrote about this too in today's Times.

Eat Pray Love

Elizabeth Gilbert's tale of her year exploring the above verbs in Italy, India, and Indonesia has been a book club favorite and enjoying a loooooooong run on the best-seller list. I am a self-styled iconoclast. If everyone else loves it, I am emphatically not interested. Until I am.

So I put it on my library hold list, and waited and waited. And then finally read it. Including reading almost the entire Italy section in one sitting after work and before a meeting. I was set to find it shallow, or silly, or obnoxiously wise. And it was those things, but it was also witty and ridiculous and honest and real. So thumbs up to Gilbert, who starts off extremely strong, and then even as it wanes in the second half, has established enough likability for the reader to see her through.

Enough. Some passages that made me smile:

David's sudden emotional back-stepping probably would've been a catastrophe for me eve under the best of circumstances, given that I am the planet's most affectionate life-form (something like a cross between a golden retriever and a barnacle), but this was my very worst of circumstances. [...] His wishdrawal only made me more needy, and my neediness only advanced his withdrawals, until soon he was retreating under fire of my weeping pleas of "Where are you going? What happened to us?
(Dating tip: Men LOVE this.)

I have to admit, I looked around when I read this, guilty, because there was a moment where I recognized this scenario a little too much. This next one though....

So Sofie and I have come to Pizzeria da Michele, and these pies we have just ordered - one for each of us - are making us lose our minds. I love my pizza so much, in fact, that I have come to believe in my delirium that my pizza might actually love me, in return. I am having a relationship with this pizza, almost an affair. Meanwhile, Sofie is practically in tears over hers, she's having a metaphysical crisis about it, she's begging me, "Why do they even bother trying to make pizza in Stockholm? Why do we even bother eating food at all in Stockholm?"

I read that and wondered, how did Gilbert ever make it past Italy? But I guess I'm glad she did.

Why Reading Rocks

Despite the fact that I do not volunteer for the Literacy Network of Greater LA (yet), I managed to get an invite to the Network's volunteer appreciation brunch this past week at the Hollywood Bowl. So my friend and I traipsed over to the Bowl Museum patio, which is gorgeous, and chatted with the staff (who is AMAZING) and ate yummy food. And most importantly, heard about and from people who are giving of themselves to help fellow Angelenos become literate. Hooray for them! My grandmother was a literacy tutor once upon a time (and we just commemorated what would have been her 83rd birthday earlier this week) so it was a nice way for me to honor her memory and also realize what an awesome gift she gave to others during her life. Yay Grandma.

I was really curious about the keynote speaker, a Dr. Danny Brassell from Cal State Dominguez Hills who is an associate professor of teacher education. He spoke about "creating readers for life," which most of you know is something is something I care a lot about. And at the same time barely "get" b/c I became a "reader for life" so young, and so without intention - there's this part of me that can't understand not loving reading. So I was worried when I heard 45 minutes, but those were 45 very short minutes. Brassell was a fantastic pick for a Saturday morning brunch: energetic and funny and irreverent and goofy. He treated us like we were about 8, and that was fantastic. And in the end, his main message was simple. You have to meet readers-to-be where they are at. It's not about you, it's about them. Plus, it's easier to remember things when they have a jingle or a dance. But you already knew that, right?

Here's his website. Where he recommends what clearly my parents did to create me.

My mission is to increase interest in reading by providing cool, short book recommendations for all ages. From interest comes devotion. As teachers, parents or whatever state we find ourselves in, we often cannot find time to read for fun, and I think it is important that our children see us reading for pleasure.

Exactly. You rock. Reading rocks. I need to do more of it.

Charlotte

On my mom's advice, I read Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test and did a term paper on Ken Kesey and One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. When I was in 11th grade. I'm not really sure I was ready for the Merry Pranksters. But I really enjoyed it. And I got a big kick out of Tom Wolfe's style.

And The Right Stuff became one of my favorite books of all time. Despite being more "masculine" in style than most things I like, it was just so powerful and evocative - and history! - and I loved it.

But Wolfe's social commentary fiction? Not so much. Which isn't to say that I didn't enjoy Bonfire of the Vanities or A Man in Full. Because I did. But man, Wolfe can come off as so judgmental. It can be a little much.

Which brings me to I am Charlotte Simmons. I was afraid of this book, b/c Wolfe spent a semester at Stanford while I was there, walking around in his white suit and clearly researching such important terms as "hooking up" and "dormcest." And even though talking heads kept comparing his fictional Dupont College to Duke, I knew that it had a whole lot of Stanford in there. And I wasn't in the mood to be judged. Not on my alma mater.

And speaking of my alma mater, I felt as though Wolfe laid me totally bare within 10 pages, when a drunken frat boy expounds on the "exaltation" of being recognized as a Dupont student:

Everyone, male or female, who was right now, as he was, in the undergraduate division, Dupont College, or had ever graduated from Dupont College knew that feeling, treasured that feeling, sought one way or another to enjoy that feeling daily if at all possible, now and for the rest of his life - yet nobody had ever captured that feeling in words, and God knows no Dupont man, or Dupont woman, for that matter, had ever tried to describe it out loud to a living soul, not even to others within this charming aristocracy. They weren't fools, after all.

And that's it exactly.

I was able to forgive the plot implausibilities and fixation on the word "rutting" and annoying self-pity throughout the rest of the novel (which is a fun read btw, in a very longguilty pleasure sort of way) because Wolfe had captured that feeling so completely.

AWW