April Reads

Over a Thousand Hills I Walk With You by Hanna Jansen

Jeanne is a survivor of the Ywanada genocide. A child of a rich family, she is witness to a world turned upside down.


Fire by Bill Bright & Jack Cavanaugh

Josiah Rush leaves his hometown of Havenhill, outcast. As a young man he accepted the blame for an accident which results in three people’s death by fire. Now he returns, seven years later at the behest of his best friend from the school days, to serve as their minister. He knows he’ll be facing a lot of judgement. The town has changed a lot, suffering from what Josiah calls “soul sickness.” He sets out to find it’s root and to save the town, even though the odds are against him. I enjoyed the book…the characters were interesting, and the story was overall well written.

One area irritated me, though. At one point, a big slaver arranges a slave auction in Havenhill in hopes of eventually turning the town into a slave port. The citizens decide to outfox the slaver by joining the auction, outbidding everyone, and setting the slaves free (putting them on a ship back to Africa ). The slaver is outraged. My question…..why would the slaver care? No matter who bid for the slaves, that money still went into his personal purse. Releasing the slaves also did not impact the slaver’s profit margin. That part of the story didn’t make sense to me.


The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver

I’ve been planning to read this book for a long time. I adored Kingsolver’s The Bean Tree. The Reverend Price takes his wife and four daughters to the Congo where he hopes to convert the Congolese to christianity. We quickly learn that he is a horrible, hateful man, completely self-absorbed and seeing things only his way. As a result, he makes no progress with the natives, and quickly alienates his own family. We follow the thoughts of the five women as they try to adjust to life in this foreign place, during a time when the Congo is in political turmoil. Between the natural disasters and the violence of mankind, they reevaluate their existing views of God and shape into a completely different family.


The Ghost Map (the story of London ’s most terrifying epidemic – and how it changed science, cities, and the modern world) by Steven Johnson

This nonfiction book is fascinating. It’s written in a truly engaging manner, not just dry facts. I loved hearing about some of the 18th Century London jobs that no longer exist – like nightsoil men. There were several of these jobs designed to help control a city’s waste management. As the city became larger and as the economic demographics changed, these positions were eliminated, allowing the waste to grow out of control.

I always knew that cholera was transmitted by polluted water. However, the book explained that cholera had ALWAYS existed in the water. So, what caused this bacteria to go from being a common, harmless thing to an epidemic that killed thousands in a matter of days? The explanation boils down to waste management and the pollution of drinking water. Cholera was designed to consume human excrement. In order to effect a human being, it had to be ingested. Normally, since humans do not ingest excrement, the cholera bacteria would have been passed out of the human digestive system without any notice. However, as human waste began to build up in the drinking water, everything changed. In addition, bacteria – with its tremendously fast reproductive and evolution cycle – was able to change into a strain that was even more dangerous. Normally, a parasite needs to keep the host alive as long as possible to survive. However, once the bacteria was able to survive by passing quickly and easily from one host to another, the need to keep the host alive was unnecessary, and the strain began to reproduce more quickly and become viciously virulent.

The book discussed how medical studies communicated their theories on how to cure cholera….generally by argumentative articles in the local newspaper. There were no processes available to guide research, ensure data accuracy, and to protect the general public. Also, the process of research into the actual cause of cholera was limited and often misguided. It was fascinating to read on the progress of the medical research.

Why do some nationalities have low tolerances to alcohol or lactose? Johnson throws out his theory on this one. Nationalities with no tolerance to alcohol trace back to hunter/gatherer tribes (American Indian, Eskimo, Aborigines); their introduction to alcohol has been fairly recent in the scope of genetic evolution. Nationalities that came from cities or agrian backgrounds started drinking alcohol a long time ago. Alcohol is, actually, a poison; many of the early users died from alcohol poisoning or from the effects of alcohol abuse (cerosis). Those who drank alcohol and survived (exhibited an early tolerance to the poison) passed on their genetic predisposition to their descedants. Similarly, dairy from milk and goats is not natural to the human diet. Many non-white cultures (Indian, Asian, African, etc.) are lactose-intolerant. Again, we can trace the ability to consume milk products back to those civilizations that were predominantly herders. The increased lactose tolerance was genetically passed on.


The Cheese Monkeys by Chip Kidd

This little story is hilarious. You follow the progress of a young man goes to college as an art major. He doesn’t even particularly LIKE art, but there is no major for “making stuff.” We get a description of the creative friends he makes, the classes he takes, his quirky teachers, and his personal development as he discovers what he really loves – graphic design. The dialogue is intelligent and humorous. I think my niece would love this.


Resurrection by Tucker Malarkey

A mystery intrigue novel based on the Lost Gospels of Nag Hammadi, along the lines of The DaVinci Code (which I loved). It’s post WWII, and Gemma (a nurse) is still mourning her mother’s death when she receives communication from her father. He’s working on a very exiciting project in Egypt , and he tells her he thinks it will change Christianity. He is purchasing a home, and the plans are for Gemma to join him soon. The next thing she knows, she is notified of his death from heart attack. While she is contemplating how a healthy, vivacious man with no heart problems can suddenly have a heart attack, she receives a package that her father mailed just before his death. It contains a piece of an ancient script. Gemma goes to Egypt to claim her father’s remains….and to uncover the mystery of his suspicious death and to unveil the mystery of his project.



Step-by-Step Composition Techniques for Digital Photographers by Ernst Wildi

Neatly organized into a variety of categories….different things to look for when composing pictures to avoid distractions and to help reinforce the subject. His strength was clearly in the landscape realm. His written tips for portraits was all right, but his pictures for them were ridiculous…particularly when he was talking about “natural” poses. I thought the first half of the book was quite helpful, and then it went downhill from there.

The Root of All Evil

I suck at money management. Always have. Can't wrap my brain around "estimating" expenses....if I don't keep penny by penny tabs, I always find that I've spent way more than I though I had. I never have a slush fund....I live paycheck to paycheck. I can't seem to figure out the whole budget thing.

This is a source of contention with my husband. He asks where all of my money goes. I always say I don't know, and that is the truth! I don't buy clothes or jewelry or make up. I stopped buying books and scrapbook supplies years ago. I fire the housekeeper. My extravagances these days seem to be taking the boys out to eat. And we don't even do that much any more. I do spend $35 a month on BlockBuster to Go. Should I cancel that? Probably.

I really want to get better at this. It's not fair that DH pays all of the bills (except for daycare). I contribute virtually nothing to this family. I don't like that DH has so little respect for me; salt in the wound that I have brought it on myself.

He wants to change careers. He's been unhappy in his job for a long time, and I of all people know what it is to hate your job. I want to support him in his decision to change jobs. But, as he pointed out today, a career change means a reduction in income, and doesn't think he can count on me to help. I offered to let him take over my money management altogether. Give me an allowance. Give him access to my account and let him handle the bills. He has not accepted this offer.

So, this is what I will do. I will send him a weekly financial report of all my expenses. Here is what I got paid. This is what I spent and on what. Here is my credit card payment and outstanding balance. What would he like to see me do differently?

This is me handing over a piece of my independence. Financial dependency used to outrage me. Now I don't care. It's a burden to me, since I do it so poorly.

OCD

My brother is a prankster and good-natured comedian. Whereever he is, people are laughing and having a good time. For this reason, he is surrounded by people who love him and call him friend...even when he is more inclined to call them "acquaintance." The downside to his personality is that we often forget that underneath the humor and amiability is a smart, deep-thinking man.

In short, he's often brilliant.

He had a brief conversation with my husband in which only the sparest detail has been passed to me. DH told me just enough to rile me up, it being his nature to put me off-kilter. Something about how I am generally surrounded by turmoil and trouble of my own making, and that I'm obsessive compulsive.

Trying to turn it into a joke, but really being somewhat hurt by the insinuation, I called my brother and challenged him on it. He did some skirting, but admitted that he thought I was OCD.

At first I was derisive. But even I had to finally admit that there was something to the accusation, since I dwelled on that comment for weeks.

One to overthink a subject to death. That's me. One to get onto a new passion and work on it frenzedly. That's me. Hold a grudge. That' me.

Funny that I could live this lifestyle for 40+ years and not see it for what it is. I might not be the kind of person that locks and unlocks a door twenty times or follows destructive rituals to the point of exhaustion (is hashing over a subject for months a destructive ritual?), but I have to admit that I do have OCD tendencies. Combine that with my anxiety and depression patterns, I finally have to admit to myself that lived my adult life with a form of mental illness. Have I lived my life successfully? Meaning, have I lived a full life despite my disorder, or have I lived a crippled life because of it. My answer is different depending upon the day.

My brother-in-law lost his five year battle to cancer. I flew to my sister's side in hopes of being help to her. Instead, I had this most horrible realization while I was there. My family expects nothing of me. Asks nothing of me. Because they think me incapable of providing it? It hasn't always been this way, which makes me think that maybe I've gotten much worse over the years. My sister was glad I was there; I know that. But, she got her emotional support from her girlfriends and from my brother (proving once again his amazing insight). Originally, there was a fear that T's husband may have left her into financial straits, and plans were made to organize her bills and determine the status of her current situation. The organization of this paperwork was assigned to my SIL, despite the fact that she was already overwhelmed with a number of time-consuming tasks of her own. The fact is that everyone knew she would come through for them, no matter what. Nobody asked me to do anything. I sat there like a third wheel.

Because I have created this myself. I do become overwhelmed by things, get angry and upset, and I withdraw. I don't cope well. My family knows this, and they have learned to not assign tasks to me. But somehow, I've slipped through these years without seeing what was happening.

There is another woman in my family who is socially inept. She has "problems" but nobody is particularly clear on exactly what those problems are. In the fashion typical of my family, we handle her as a family joke and embarrassment. It occurred to me that I had become another version of her. My family doesn't exclude me, but I sense now that I have sort of edged to the outside circle of my family. It used to be because I lived so far away. Now I think it is also because I simply don't function in an acceptable way. I have isolated myself. I fear that they might be joking about me the same way we did her. This horrifies me.

The worst part is that even as I see the isolation happening and I dislike it, I continue to add to it. I've been home this whole week recovering from a surgery, and I'm lonely. But I don't call my friends and I don't call my friend to say that I'm lonely and i'd like company. I tell myself instead that nobody wants to be bothered with my whining. I'm so often depressed or down about something, I'd rather keep it to myself. And the OCD spins merrily on. To fill my hour, I started reading a Western Civilization textbook, and now I've got maybe 30 books on order at the library based on interesting subjects I now want to read about in further detail. Not one or two books.....every book the library has to offer on the subject of paleonthropic and neolithic culture....and I've got a list on other Egyptian and Mesopotamian subjects to follow. Sheez. What's the point of that.

And yet, despite the fact that this worries me a bit, I'm also happy that I'm interested in something enough to want to pursue it. Because when I'm depressed, nothing interests me. So, in this way, my depression and OCD patter back and forth, and I sit and watch to see how this tennis match called my life will play out.

June Reads

A Name of Her Own by Jae Kirkpatrick

Based on the true story of Marie Dorion. An ambitious Indian woman married to a half-blood (French Canadian Indian), Pierre Dorion, wants to be wife to a successful man. Pierre works as an interpreter for the Americans seeking to make a new trading route from the old Lewis and Clarke trading trail. She hopes that he will prove himself and get the recognition that no other half-breed ever has. This does not happen, of course. Pierre wants to leave his wife in safety while he goes off on the expedition, but she forces her will so that she and her two sons accompany the expedition. The presence of a woman and children saves the troupe several times, but also challenges her definition of a mother. Does she have the right to put her sons at such risk? This is a fascinating story of the early invasion of whites into the Northwest territory, and that of a woman's place among men, as well as that of an Indian among whites.


The Painted Drum by Louise Erdrich

Poetically written. Sometimes you wonder what the point is as the author navigates between the different viewpoints of several individuals...but if you tough it out, you are well rewarded. Faye, the daughter of a half-blood mother and a white (crazy) father, is an antiques collector. She discovers an old indian drum among several other fantastic Indian artifacts in the estate of an old Indian trader. Something drives her to hide this drum from the family estate in an attempt to find the home from where it was originally stolen. We discover that the drum was built by a father, devastated by the loss of his family. His wife leaves him for another man in an ill-fated love affair. Horribly, to survive the trek to her lover, she is forced to fling her daughter into the mouths of starving wolves in order to survive. The drum is built with the bones of the dead child inside. The spirit of the daughter incompasses this drum, lending healing and sacrifice where it is needed most.


Virgin by Robin Maxwell

Just one of the many novels that Robin wrote about Queen Elizabeth. Doesn't she have any other stories in her? Anyway, this particular book has merit via her description of Anne Bolyn. Catherine Parr, Henry the VIII's last wife, brought Mary, Elizabeth, and Edward VI out of banishment and raised them lovingly as her own. She also sought to teach Elizabeth how to be queen, despite the fact that at the time it seemed highly unlikely she would ever be queen. Caherine said this....that Elizabeth had a lot to learn from her mother Anne...especially from what Anne had done wrong. She explains that Anne was an educated woman, rare at the time, and that her education served her well. However, she had never been taught to be a queen, and so her behaviors of flaunting her dislikes, hugging her power to herself and trying to hold back the people around her, served to bring on her own demise. She instructed Elizabeth to learn from her mother's mistakes and adopt her mother's virtues.


Green Girls by Michael Kimball

This book was frustrating in how obtuse the characters can be. Beliefs and suspicions are blindly converted to "fact" and the repercussions for these errors are vast. All of Michael's characters are poor communicators, hugging their stories to themselves, and refusing to share information even with those they trust. It gets really annoying.