The Gap by Benjamin Gilmour

During a summer in Sydney, Australia, paramedics Ben and John face daily tragedy while both dealing with personal struggles. "The Gap" of the title of this book is both a scenic outlook in Sydney where suicides occur frequently and a metaphor for being on edge, the story much like a real-life version of Bringing Out the Dead but with a sense of humor. 

I enjoyed Paramédico by Gilmour and was excited when I heard the author had written another book about his experiences as an "ambo". It took me a long time to acquire a copy of The Gap but it was well worth the wait. Funny, moving, at times shocking and sad, the book is a testament to the courage, compassion, frustrations, danger, and other immense challenges paramedics face daily. 

Highly recommended - Stellar writing. I love medical memoirs (especially about emergency medicine, thanks to my early obsession with the TV show Emergency!) and books about such things as emerging diseases, so The Gap was right up my alley. I have, in fact, a collection of EMS books and I think Ben's writing is by far the best I've read. He takes you to the scene without going too far into detail about the gruesome and disgusting side of patient care, focusing instead on the emotion of patients and those that care for them. 

Trigger Warning for frequent descriptions of depression and suicide.

My review of Paramédico

Note: The Gap does not yet have a US publisher and I knew about its release because the author told me about it. It took a while to find it at a price I could afford but if you're interested and you're in the US, I got my copy from Book Depository. 

©2021 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

Heart Berries by Terese Marie Mailhot

I had to give Heart Berries by Terese Marie Mailhot some thought before I even managed to rate it at Goodreads. I had (and still have) such mixed feelings. I found it poetic but strange and gut-wrenching. It's a memoir by a Native American author that's a patchwork of memories of pain, obsession, mental illness, and confusion, all written to the man she loves. She describes being institutionalized briefly after attempting suicide and her diagnoses, her early marriage and other relationships, having her son taken away by her first husband while she was pregnant with his second child, her determination to get the education she desired, her appalling childhood. But, throughout this entire narrative, there's the angst over having lost the one man she truly loves and trying to figure out if they can make it work.  

You can't help but admire the author for accomplishing so much academically while fighting to keep herself alive, make sense of her place in the world within her Native American heritage and outside of it, and protect her children from the horrors she lived through. But, I'd like it if I could have comprehended more of what she was trying to say. The writing was frustrating and disjointed. Its fragmented nature can be seen as an echo of her emotions, which were all over the place, but I'm not sure if that was a deliberate stylistic choice or she simply had to write that way for the sake of her own sanity. 

Iffy on recommendation - There are a lot of gushy pull quotes in the front of the book, and Roxane Gay's cover blurb is very positive. So, it's worth mentioning that a lot of people think Heart Berries is a fabulous work of art. I'm not among them. Her writing was just a little too vague for me. I felt like she was using poetic language to keep the story at arm's length because it's too painful. My preference is more straightforward writing. I couldn't tell, for example, what exactly her father did to her. There are hints, but whether he sexually assaulted her or not I couldn't tell. 

What I like best about the book is that it does give you a look inside her head, even if that's a rather hallucinogenic place to be. She often repeated that Native American women's bodies are neither respected nor cared for and in this she made some references to the many Native American women who have disappeared or been murdered. This is a serious issue and one that was touched on in The Roundhouse by Louise Erdrich (link leads to my mini review, within a post of several reviews), a story that shows how difficult it is for Native Americans to get justice when harmed. 

This was the January read for my personal challenge to read at least one book by a Native American or Indigenous author each month in 2021.

©2021 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

Becoming by Michelle Obama

I bought Becoming by Michelle Obama on a whim. It's been much discussed since its release and I've consistently heard nothing but good. But, not being a huge fan of memoirs, I resisted buying it or checking it out. Without bothering to find out, I think I must have assumed that the book was about her years as First Lady.

Well, I was wrong about it on all counts. First, it's the story of Michelle Obama's life, from how protective her brother was when she was a baby to her school life and how her jobs evolved, through to her years as First Lady. She talks about how her parents were never able to buy a place of their own so they lived in the cramped second floor of her aunt and uncle's home on the South Side of Chicago. She talked about the exodus of white people from the area and the schools she attended. She talked about her parents' rather laid-back assurance that their children could and would succeed and how they devoted their lives to making certain they had all the opportunities required to do so. She spoke about the schools she attended, the discouragement she ignored, how she met Barack Obama, and a little about his life. 

She shared her struggle with infertility and her frustrations and insecurities in life and in the working world. And then, of course, came the political years. You don't have to read very far into Becoming to find out Michelle Obama will never, ever go into politics. She went there as a supportive spouse but her family, especially the children and how their father's busy political life (and later life in the White House) would effect them, was always her main concern. I'd heard that her mother stayed in the White House and that relates to the way family permeates her story. She didn't want her children to miss out on having their grandmother near during their formative years, so she moved her mom into the residence. Michelle's mother kept a low profile and wouldn't let the Secret Service follow her around, so I understand now why I was never entirely sure that rumor about her mom living in the White House was true. 

I particularly enjoyed learning about how life in the White House works, what the current president pays for and what's provided, and the little details like how much work (on the part of the Secret Service) goes into stepping out on the balcony to get fresh air. 

I think everyone I know has read Becoming but if you haven't, it's worth the time. I already admired Michelle Obama as a First Lady but I found out she did even more than I was aware of. A lot more, actually. She was about as close as you can get to my hero, Eleanor Roosevelt. Both were indefatigable in their pursuit of programs to improve the lives of people both in the US and around the world. 

Highly recommended - Well-written and so heart-felt that you can't help but find yourself immersed and unwilling to put the book down till you must. At least, that's how I felt. Becoming is long at around 400 pages but it's quite a fascinating read. I've always known there are various reasons for the different cars in the presidential motorcade but she describes what each of the cars carries, what it's like to live in the White House, the challenges that a First Lady faces, how Barack Obama's days went, what effected him most deeply, how they made various decisions about their children, and which former presidents and first ladies were the most helpful to her. It's funny that a book I thought I would find so-so charmed me so thoroughly. 

Here are my favorite failed attempts to pose Becoming with Izzy. I like it when I manage to get her to put a single paw on the cover of a book but she just wanted to climb on it, the day I was trying to get an Instagram shot. 

©2020 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

Too Much and Never Enough by Mary L. Trump

I pre-ordered Too Much and Never Enough by Mary L. Trump, the current president's niece, and then waffled over whether or not to cancel the order because I've been reading about him since the 1980s. I figured I'd already know most of what she had to say. As it turned out, I was correct in some ways but not others. Too Much and Never Enough is more of a family history than a book specifically about the president, although the author explains very nicely the reasoning for his behavior in a way that others have only guessed at. So, it's marginally different from the other psychological assessments (Mary Trump is a psychologist) and explains his actions more broadly by digging into how his domineering father and absent mother formed him into the man he is today.

It was fascinating reading about the family history because Too Much and Never Enough went deeper into the dysfunction of the family than I've ever read about in any article and made sense of many things that were a little fuzzy on detail. I knew, for example, that the president's eldest brother was an alcoholic, that he died fairly young, and that the president cut off the insurance for Freddy's family members at some point in time. I didn't know much beyond that; and, the story of Freddy Trump is much, much sadder than I realized.

At any rate, I don't want to go into too much detail but there were some little bits and pieces that I found of interest. For example, I was aware that the president was not being honest when he referred to himself as a self-made man and said he'd gotten "just a million dollars" from his fabulously wealthy and controlling father. But, I didn't realize that he pretty much lived off his father's money and was allowed to spend extravagantly because he was, after Freddy failed to live up to expectations, the chosen son. Nor did I know that he was really only the publicity man and the face of the family business while his father was alive. Too Much and Never Enough also nicely explains how and why Freddy fell from grace and the president took his place, as well as why the president was held up as a success by his family and the press, even when he wasn't actually making business decisions and, later, after he'd failed so thoroughly at his own ventures that the only banks that would loan to him were outside of the country.

The author does a good job of laying out the growth of the family's wealth and how they are all about money and power. She vaguely describes their tax evasion; talks about how they've used political and mob connections to their advantage; and, describes their decadent spending contrasted with cheapness in buying gifts (often regifting unwanted items or giving items that were wholly inappropriate to each other).

There's also this paragraph, a portion of which a friend on Facebook posted and I went to look up (I'd forgotten all about it):

While thousands of Americans die alone, Donald touts stock market gains. As my father lay dying alone, Donald went to the movies. If he can in any way profit from your death, he'll facilitate it, and then he'll ignore the fact that you died. 

~p. 209

Recommended - Too Much and Never Enough was much better written and more informative than I expected, if a little uneven, as it jumped back and forth in time. But I can't say I enjoyed the reading because the family is described as such a greedy and vicious bunch (the kind of people who spend a holiday together making cutting remarks about each other, except the favored child, to whom praise is expected from everyone) that I was sick of them by the time I was halfway through the book. Still, I think it's worth the read and I have no regrets.


©2020 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

Mini reviews - The Lost Man by Jane Harper, The Same Sky by Amanda Eyre Ward, and The Last Light Breaking by Nick Jans

It just occurred to me that I should use as much of the week as possible while I'm trying to quickly crank out reviews to finish up 2019, so I may go ahead and post on the weekends and/or skip Fiona Friday until I've caught up and posted my final list with links to all reviews from 2019. I'm going to wing it, for now. Husband may not let me get away with that, so we'll just have to see if that works out. I've just gotten my phone back from the store where I left it behind, so I will go ahead and post a Fiona Friday image, tomorrow.

The Lost Man by Jane Harper is about three brothers. One has become an outcast and lives on a remote piece of his family's property. One feels like he's being treated like he's stupid and left completely out of the decision-making. The third was considered the responsible, likable one. He was married with two children but his body has just turned up in a very strange place, next to a lone grave and far enough from his car that it appears he may have committed suicide. But, something doesn't feel quite right about his death and the outcast brother decides to find out what really happened.

I don't have the book next to me but I remember the story well, if not the names of the characters. As in her previous two books, Jane Harper's Australian setting is practically a character in and of itself, it's so vivid. When she talks about the dust, the dryness, the heat, the way the fine red soil gets into the creases of one's clothing, it's so well described that the real world feels a little unreal for a moment, when you set the book down. The characterization is every bit as sharp. I am so impressed by Jane Harper.

Highly recommended - I was a little disappointed when I found out Jane Harper's third book wasn't going to star the police officer with a wounded soul but an honorable heart of the first two books but I shouldn't have been. I'm not a mystery fan but Jane Harper's writing absolutely sweeps me away. The Lost Man has a slightly slow beginning as you get to know the characters but once you've been introduced to the cast and the questions about the death have been posed, the story becomes absolutely mesmerizing. I continued guessing all the way to the end of the book and I closed the book thinking it was Harper's best.

My copy of The Same Sky by Amanda Eyre Ward was ordered from Book Depository so just a warning, up front: that's probably the British cover. The publisher is Blackfriars, which sounds very British, but I'm just guessing. If you're American and this story appeals to you, be aware that you probably won't see this cover if you go looking for it.

The Same Sky tells two interconnected stories. One is the tale of a young Honduran girl who lives with her grandmother and twin brothers. Her mother lives in Austin, Texas and sends home money but after things deteriorate, Carla and her brother, Junior, are constantly starving. When he starts sniffing glue to help him forget his hunger, Carla knows it's past time to attempt the harrowing journey North. Will they survive?

In the second storyline, Alice is infertile due to breast cancer treatment in her college years and a baby she and her husband were going to adopt has been reclaimed by his mother. Is it time to give up on ever having a child?

It's pretty obvious how Carla and Alice's stories will intersect (Trigger Warning for rape) and, as is often the case in books with two storylines, I favored one over the other — the favorite being Carla's story. I didn't feel like Alice's story was entirely necessary but that's a personal preference. After I wrote that I was unsure why the author bothered to tell Alice's story, on Instagram, another reader and bookstagrammer told me she liked the story just as it is. I wondered if Ward showed Alice's side for the contrast. Alice and her husband have a successful business but feel their lives are incomplete without a family. Carla's family is scattered and struggling in ways mostly unimaginable to an American, so there definitely is a stark difference between their lives.

Recommended but I had mixed feelings - While I think immigrant stories are especially important at this moment, I felt like The Same Sky was a little too disjointed and that some of the elements should have been glossed over or eliminated entirely. I gave it 3 1/2 ⭐. For those who may be wondering, yes I've heard of American Dirt. In fact, I've pre-ordered a copy. I tried to win one (I don't know how many drawings I signed up for) but failed. Before I did so, I'd already pre-ordered it, anyway. It just means I have to wait till its release. 

There's an interesting story behind how I found The Last Light Breaking by Nick Jans. About 10 years ago, the first time we went to Alaska on vacation, Huzzybuns neglected to book one night's lodging in the middle of our stay. Seriously, he just skipped that night. When he realized he'd messed up, the only place he could find for us to stay was on the opposite side of the Kenai Peninsula from where we were staying the rest of the time, in a former cannery. He booked it because he had no other options and it turned out to be a cool side trip because it was on the drive across the peninsula that we saw the one and only moose we encountered on that trip. 

Our room in the former cannery was frigid (the thermostat set in the 50s) when we arrived but there was a little lobby area with corner seating where we could hang out while the room warmed up and a shelf of books on each wall for the guests to borrow. I flipped through a few before settling down to read The Last Light Breaking. I only read a single chapter (it's a series of essays about the author's life in Alaska with Inupiat Eskimos) but I was so impressed that I wrote down the title and author and put the book on my wish list. It took several years before I got a copy via Paperback Swap and I suppose it's taken me so long to actually read The Last Light Breaking because of all the ARCs I've given priority, over the years, but it finally called out to me during my winter break from blogging and I listened. 

The essays in The Last Light Breaking tell Nick Jans' story (not in exact timeline order, but so well that it didn't feel like that mattered): how and why he ended up traveling to Alaska, his experience as a new guy (and not a native in a predominantly native region) in town, the jobs he's held, many of the trips he's made around the area to camp, hunt, fish, hike, etc., and what he's learned from his neighbors and friends. Nick Jans is an adventurer and a people person, so the book is particularly fun to read if you like reading about adventure, interaction, and what it's like to live with the Inupiat, who are among the few natives who actually are OK with the word "Eskimo".

Speaking of the word "Eskimo" and why it's not always OK . . . my son had a swim coach from Alaska. He was indigenous but Tlingit, from Juneau, not a people for whom the term "Eskimo" is used, so he considers it offensive if you call him an Eskimo.

Highly recommended - Stunning writing that will make you feel like you've been on an adventure with the author and convince you that the land is sacred. I will be looking for more by Jans and I wish I'd read him sooner.

When we were in Alaska, or maybe before, I read up on the native way of life and why they still consider subsistence living (hunting and fishing in the traditional ways for food, fuel, etc.) important so I had no problem with some of the things Jans did with his friends but I would caution the squeamish and anyone who objects to the killing of animals for any reason that there are a few graphic scenes that you might need to skim.

©2020 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

Where the Angels Lived by Margaret McMullan

Where the Angels Lived by Margaret McMullan is a memoir about the author's search for a relative's life story. The "angels" in the title refers to a family name, Engel, which translates to angel. When Margaret McMullan went to Israel and did some research at Yad Vashem, she discovered that Richard Engel de Janosi, a relative she never knew existed, had been killed in the Holocaust. She was charged with filling out a document about him for Yad Vashem and told that it was her duty to remember him.

With this task given to her, McMullan got a job teaching English literature in Hungary specifically so she could find out more about Richard and any other lost relatives. In the process, she learned all about the importance of her family, visited the places they'd lived, and slowly uncovered their stories. She was aided by some unknown relatives who came into her life during the search, made some new Hungarian friends, learned about the culture and traditions of Hungary, and became acquainted with the still-simmering anti-Semitism in the country.

Recommended - A little like a family detective story, part travel guide, and part Hungarian history. I really enjoyed this book. It took me forever to read, partly because we were working on preparing for Kiddo's wedding (which we were more involved in than the average groom's parents) and partly because I spent a lot of time looking up images of places and people mentioned. Where the Angels Lived has a lengthy bibliography and it was the mention of Marguerite Duras' memoir, The War, that prompted me to purchase a copy.

Obviously, I had a little fun with the photo. I just happened to have a pair of angel's wings from last Halloween. When I bought them, I thought it was unlikely I'd genuinely ever find a use for them but they were so cool! I feel like I've found their purpose as a prop.

I bought my copy of Where the Angels Lived for group discussion and unfortunately didn't finish the book till a week after my F2F group met. I'm glad I read it, though, and it just so happens that the author lives in my state, so the copy I bought was autographed. Bonus! I particularly recommend Where the Angels Lived to people who are interested in stories about family and culture or who are interested in stories of WWII, although it goes well beyond Richard's WWII story.


©2019 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

What Happened by Hillary Rodham Clinton

I feel like this review needs a disclaimer. When What Happened came out, I had no interest in reading what I presumed would be a rehash of what happened in the 2016 election to make it go wrong for Hillary Clinton. But, then seemingly every old, white male in America (or, at least, those with access to Twitter) and everyone on Fox simultaneously appeared to tell Hillary Clinton to "sit down and shut up", "take up knitting", or simply said her days in politics were over and she should be ignored. I ordered a copy of What Happened, then, in defiance of the narrative that told the candidate who got the most votes in the 2016 election that she shouldn't be heard. But, again, it wasn't a book I was all that interested in reading so it went on the stacks and sat there for about a year. I picked it up to read when I realized March was Women's History Month. As a long-time public servant and the first female presidential nominee, Hillary Rodham Clinton has certainly made history for women.

What Happened is not just about the election or the election season as a whole. In the book, former Secretary Clinton reflects on her many years of public service, her beliefs and their roots (including how her beliefs as a Methodist influenced her decision to go into public service), her mother's influence, and her own experience as a mother, wife, and female. Here, for example, is a quote in which she reminds readers of the real meaning of the word "feminism", which has recently become badly distorted:

While we're defining things, let's take a moment for feminism: "the advocacy of women's rights on the basis of the political, economic, and social equality of the sexes." Not domination. Not oppression. Equality. Or as the English writer and philosopher Mary Wollstonecraft put it 225 years ago, "I do not wish women to have power over men, but over themselves."

~p. 132

And, here's a quote that I thought described how the other candidate managed to dodge scandal while Clinton was buried in a controversy (also described in detail -- how and why Clinton chose to use a home server and why her choice to use a personal phone was not unusual at the time).

Most of the press was too busy chasing ratings and scandals, and Trump was too slippery to be pinned down. He understood the needs and impulses of the political press well enough that if he gave them a new rabbit every day, they'd never catch any of them. So his reckoning never came. 

~p. 232

I was surprised how much I learned from the reading of What Happened. There were a lot of subjects from which I'd skimmed the surface but Hillary Clinton, having been a First Lady, a senator, and a Secretary of State, knows the dangers of Putin intimately, for example. She knows his history, his methods, and has interacted with him on many occasions. She understands his motivation. I knew enough to say, "Uh-oh," when I heard that the Republican platform had changed in a way that benefitted Putin, and I knew much of Trump's history with the Russians but my knowledge lacked depth. I also had a vague understanding of the connection between what she calls "Christian morality and white nationalist purity and power" and Putin, and had connected the dots with the help of some people I follow (to what Trump is doing: suppressing LGBTQ and women's rights) but she clarified it nicely.

And, finally, there were plenty of stories that were reported so badly that I always wondered what on earth the reporters and my right-wing friends were going on about -- she explained these well. For example, I had friends who said that Hillary Clinton planned to put coal miners out of business and that she was evil for taking away jobs. I'd seen the clip but was never able to find the context of what was said. She repeats the entire paragraph from which her comment -- making it sound like she was happy to be putting people out of work -- was taken, so that you can see how the context was about her understanding that a move to clean energy would put people in the coal industry out of work, so it was important (in her viewpoint) to make sure those people were taken care of with transitional help and job training in order to make sure they were able to continue to survive. This particular story certainly shows how poorly the press covered Hillary Clinton. I couldn't even locate the full transcript online, at the time when friends were talking about Hillary "gleefully" putting people out of work. I presumed the full story wasn't being told but reading her book was the first chance I had to truly understand what she was attempting to get across to viewers.

I've seen similarly misleading stories happening in my own world in real time. When the Mississippi River was flooding, a few years ago, we went to downtown Vicksburg to see how far the water had gone. Vicksburg used to have the nickname "The San Francisco of the South" because of its steep hills and while there are still homes in various flood zones (at least one entire subdivision, away from the river, was bought out because it flooded so frequently), most of the city and surrounding area sits well above the flood plain. So, what did you, the viewer, see on the national news during this historic flood? The cameras were positioned on a hill, where tons of people were happily walking around, looking down upon a former train station (now a museum) that floods every single time the Mississippi leaves its banks. It was incredibly misleading but dramatic. This is the way Hillary Clinton says her email "scandal" was portrayed. You didn't get the full story, ever. It was nice to read the full story.

Highly recommended - Written with grace and humility, Hillary Clinton's memoir of the election, with reminiscences of her life in public service, is both nicely written and informative. I was surprised how much I learned and how much I enjoyed her voice. I have only two small complaints. It appears that the book was rushed to press. There are a few errors. Most are not major; they just jumped out at me for their inaccuracy. She said, for example, that Narcan "can save lives by helping prevent overdoses". Narcan actually reverses the effect of narcotics on the system (often painfully so, depending on how skillfully it's administered) but it doesn't prevent overdose. I hope this misstatement has been changed in subsequent printings. The other complaint is that I thought she hammered James Comey's influence on the election a little too hard. I agree with her that he made some mistakes and they likely swung the election but two mentions would have been enough. I counted four. Otherwise, I found What Happened so interesting that I may reread it, at some point.


©2019 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

The Threat by Andrew McCabe

That day, North Korea was on the president's mind. North Korea had recently conducted a test of an intercontinental ballistic missile, potentially capable of sriking the U.S. -- Kim Jong-un had called the test a Fourth of July "gift" to "the arrogant Americans." But the president did not believe it had happened. The president thought it was a hoax. He thought that North Korea did not have the capability to launch such missiles. He said he knew this because Vladimir Putin had told him so.

~p. 136


I'm not actually sure what possessed me to order a copy of The Threat by Andrew G. McCabe. I've ordered a few political books, in the past year or two, but I'm not all that hot about getting to them. However, The Threat turns out not to really be a book about politics but a memoir, although McCabe certainly describes the Trump administration from his viewpoint and experience, including his direct interactions with the president and staff. It is, however, about Andrew McCabe's time in the FBI -- how he made the decision to go from a high-paying job as a lawyer to a much lower-paying job as an FBI agent, for starters. It describes his training and various cases that he was involved in during his FBI years. Yes, he does mention Trump and the dangers he believes this president is causing. But, it wasn't the defensive work of writing that I anticipated.

There were two things that really jumped out at me. One was that Andrew McCabe's early years were spent working on investigating the mafia, including the Russian mafia. I think I'd read that somewhere, but it didn't sink in till I read it a second time and in the words of McCabe, himself, and then it was a bit of an "A-ha!" moment. If, as many people have said, Trump is truly involved with Russian money laundering (I've been reading about that for years, long before he ran for president -- his connections with Russia are nothing new), it makes sense that he'd want to keep McCabe out of the top FBI job, doesn't it?

The other thing that jumped out at me was his description of his work after 9/11. On the day of the terrorist attacks, McCabe was posted in New York City but he was away from the office when the first tower was hit. His response was to drive into Manhattan, lights flashing, turn in his FBI vehicle, and get to work. Eventually, the people in the Manhattan office had to be moved because the dust from the Twin Towers was causing problems with ventilation. Truly, anyone who drove into the horror for the sake of American security is a hero to me, whether an emergency responder or a desk jockey.

I think perhaps the most important tidbit of information is one that most everyone has probably heard, by now, but which is described in better detail by McCabe than I've seen elsewhere and that is the president's complete inability to even listen to and process the daily security briefings. I'm recalling this without any reference (I didn't mark his descriptions of the briefings and don't even remember if he was present or he described this secondhand) but what he said was that on one particular occasion, not only did the president not absorb what he was being told but he only let the people briefing him talk for a minute or two and then spent the rest of the time talking, himself, about things that were totally irrelevant to security. The problem with that is, of course, that the president needs to have a complete understanding of the threats to our nation and be able to make quick decisions in the event of an emergency. McCabe has no confidence at all in his ability to respond to a national emergency with the knowledge and understanding needed.

Highly recommended - Personal opinion: every American needs to read The Threat. It's very well written and compelling information about how the FBI works, some of the cases they've solved (those McCabe worked on, specifically), security issues we face as a nation, and why our current president is endangering us. McCabe doesn't spend a lot of time defending himself from the president's accusations but the final chapter is a little emphatic. And, when relevant, he describes how the current administration treats members of various agencies and the reasons he considers the administrations actions a danger. McCabe also describes how right-wing "news" stories that are completely fabricated are being accepted by main-stream news as facts, constantly putting agencies in a defensive posture. It's a book that will unnerve you -- not just because of the dangers Trump poses but because of close calls with terror that McCabe describes. But, in general, it really is just a typical memoir and a very good one.


©2019 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

Born a Crime by Trevor Noah

First things first. I've already read Born a Crime and reviewed it, once. So, here's my 2016 review of Born a Crime. This time, I read the book for group discussion and then it rained on the night of the meeting. I won't drive the 30 miles to my book group when it rains because the traffic is a little too dangerous driving through our God-kicked-over-the-bucket downpours, but I did get to talk to our group's host to see what people thought.

The general consensus was that everyone loved the book and thought it was a nice, light read for summer. I didn't get to hear any specifics, otherwise, but my friend Jeanine gave me permission to quote her thoughts from an email:

"This was one of the most entertaining books I have read in a long time. I thought it gave an interesting take on what it's like being on the inside of Apartheid while still managing to keep things moving and sparing us the most agonizing details. That's good for a summer read. At the same time, it's a good lesson about the resiliency of the human spirit in difficult circumstances." 

I had some thoughts that were a bit different, this time around, and I'll just mention one thing that meant a bit more to me. The first time I read Born a Crime, I had not yet been to South Africa. So it was interesting, the second time, reading about Trevor Noah's time in the townships and actually having a frame of reference. We would call townships the poor side of town or maybe something like the "projects". He does a great job of describing what they look like. You see a lot of tin shacks and small houses built from blocks, stores set up inside shipping containers, and sometimes just a random wall or set of walls. I wondered about the walls. He said people will at first build a shack and then they'll slowly build on by adding a wall at a time and then eventually putting on a roof. But, they're people who have very little money so it takes time to build and that's why you'll see these really random looking walls beside the shacks.

I flipped through my pictures from Langa, a township in the Cape Town area and found a shot of some smaller tin homes next to houses:

Langa doesn't look slummy; it's a poor area but really a fairly tidy, functioning community. The thing that interested me the most was the fact that it's pretty much an island unto itself, according to the man who took us on a tour through the township. Some people leave to work jobs in the city but you can do all of your shopping, get a haircut, order phone service, and go to school, etc., within the township. It's a necessity for the township to function that way because not everyone has access or the money to afford transportation to the big city, which in this case was Cape Town. That reminds me of one of my favorite quotes from Born a Crime:

People always lecture the poor: "Take responsibility for yourself! Make something of yourself!" But with what raw materials are the poor to make something of themselves?

People love to say, "Give a man a fish, and he'll eat for a day. Teach a man to fish, and he'll eat for a lifetime." What they don't say is, "And it would be nice if you gave him a fishing rod."

~from p. 190 of Born a Crime

Highly recommended - One of my top 5 memoirs of all time. I need to find a copy of this book on audio because I've heard it's even better hearing it read by Noah. It would definitely be helpful to hear some of the African words pronounced. A wonderful true story of life as an outsider in his own country, life during Apartheid and after, life as a poor person who learned that humor makes anything bearable. I just can't say enough positive things about this book.

©2018 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

Spies in the Family by Eva Dillon

Spies in the Family: An American Spymaster, His Russian Crown Jewel, and the Friendship that Helped End the Cold War is part memoir, part spy story about a CIA operative, Paul Dillon, and a Russian spy he handled. That spy, Dmitri Polyakov, was possibly the most important GRU agent ever "turned" by the CIA and the author is the daughter of the CIA operative who worked with him. Eva Dillon weaves her personal story in with the information she learned through personal interviews and extensive reading. But, the focus of the book is on the relationship mentioned in the subtitle: the people the two spies interacted with, the methods of their spycraft, the occasional betrayals and deaths of various spies, and what became of Paul Dillon and Dmitri Polyakov.

I was impressed with the readability of this particular work of nonfiction. Books about intelligence operations can be surprisingly dry or convoluted, but I never had any trouble at all discerning the relationships, remembering the real-life characters and distinguishing them from each other, following the use of various spying tools and methods, etc. In fact, the Cold War is a time period I tend to avoid because the little I've read has been too dry for me.

Not Spies in the Family. The story was told well and felt complete but left me wanting to read more about the Cold War era, particularly espionage memoirs of a similar nature. There's an extensive list of references in the back of the book and I may need to scratch down a few titles before I send my ARC on to Eldest (who is besotted with the Cold War era in the way I am with WWII). Kiddo has been begging me to read a biography of CIA Director William Casey that he loved, as well, and while I've been lukewarm about the subject matter and brushed him off for several years, I've moved the book to my bedroom TBR. My interest in Cold War spying has definitely been piqued.

Highly recommended - A well-written, easily digestible story of two spies, their families, the agencies in which they worked, and the methods they used. Really enjoyed this read and found it was easy to keep all the characters straight. I particularly found the communication methods and tools fascinating. And, I enjoyed reading about what it was like being the daughter of a spy, moving from post to post, while not aware of what her father's job entailed. I gave Spies in the Family 5 stars at Goodreads.


©2018 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

When They Call You a Terrorist: a Black Lives Matter Memoir by Patrisse Khan-Cullors and Asha Bandele

I love reading memoirs but sometimes they just rip your heart out and that's the case with When They Call You a Terrorist by Patrisse Kahn-Cullors, the story of the author's life and how she and two other women came to found the Black Lives Matter movement.

Beginning with her childhood in Van Nuys, California, Kahn-Cullors describes what it was like growing up impoverished, hungry, black, constantly dogged by law enforcement, and without much parental guidance. The author had 3 siblings and her mother, originally from a middle class background, was forced to fend for herself after her family kicked her out for becoming pregnant at 16. From the time she was small, the author knew her mother as a woman who left for work before dawn and came home late at night, working 2 or 3 jobs just to get by. Her father came and went after he lost his factory job and, eventually, Kahn-Cullors found out that she had a different biological father from that of her siblings. Both were unreliable in their own ways, so young Patrisse looked up to her brothers, the only reliable men in her life.

The author became aware of how black people were singled out by police at an early age, noting that the black people around her were treated differently by the court system, almost expected to become criminals, even in schools. The latter is something I was aware of when my children were in school. Posted in the window of the middle school office and outside the high school office were posters listing crimes and their likely punishments. I tried, unsuccessfully, to get them removed.

The author is bisexual (she prefers the term "Queer"), her eldest brother has a severe mental illness, and the entire family has been impacted by the targeting of blacks that came about due to the so-called "War on Drugs," so she has a lot of different challenges to tackle and all are described in gut-wrenching detail. Her experiences led her to become an activist at a young age and she describes the various movements that she participated in before she and two other women founded the Black Lives Matter movement.

What a shocking, horrifying, eye-opening read. One of the biggest surprises: I had no idea that the Black Lives Matter movement was founded by women and is still a women's movement. Kahn-Cullors expressed her frustration about this. There are men who participate and even they were well aware that in our patriarchal society the press gravitates toward the men for statements. I found myself nodding. Had the press focused on the fact that women founded the BLM movement, I wouldn't have gone into the reading of Patrisse Kahn-Cullors' memoir thinking otherwise.

The author talked about other efforts she's been involved in, besides the attempt to bring awareness to how the police and court systems treat black men vs. how they treat others. Some of those efforts were finding success until the recent presidential election set them back: the attempt to halt the building of prisons and instead funnel public funding into programs that positively impact impoverished communities, for example, and the effort to demilitarize police forces.

I found the challenge the author's brother and her family have faced, just in dealing with his mental illness, particularly interesting because it touches on a subject I've heard about, the fact that police officers are either not trained to discern the difference between mental illness and deliberate violence or too focused on racial profiling. I've heard of cases in which family members carefully warn police officers that someone is mentally ill and needs to be approached a certain way, only to be met with (often deadly) force, instead. The author speculates that the trauma of being targeted by police, treated violently, left without parents or support when their elders are imprisoned, and being imprisoned for offences in which nobody is harmed may even be the source of some mental illness. It took quite a few terrifying years and two imprisonments before her own brother even had a solid diagnosis, more time to get his medication balanced properly, and a continuing effort by a network of family and friends to keep him on his medication and get him the proper help when he needs it.

Highly recommended - A rough read, but a good one, I spent a great deal of my reading time with tears in my eyes. Some readers might feel a little judgmental about many of the details of Kahn-Cullors' life. She's not straight, her mother had 4 children by two different men, and drugs were, in fact, a common problem in her community. It's important to look past what some of us may consider "sinful" and think, instead, "What can we do to stop the impoverished from taking drugs, getting pregnant young, etc., in the first place? What societal changes will help stop the destructive patterns?" Kahn-Cullors offers up some solutions: creating green spaces, offering support to those who have parents in prison, providing medical and mental healthcare, feeding those who are hungry. I hope this memoir will help to open a few more eyes to the dramatic inequalities faced by black Americans.


©2017 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

An American Family by Khizr Khan

I read An American Family by Khizr Khan near the end of September so there are details I've forgotten. But, the one thing that really sticks with me is the sense of admiration I felt for the author and the experience of reading about how much pain the family went through after losing their son to a bomber in Iraq.

Let me back up a little, in case there's anyone out there who is unaware of who Khizr Khan is, since I spent many years refusing to talk politics or vote. Khizr Khan and his wife are gold-star parents (meaning parents who lost a son or daughter during his or her American military service) who spoke at the Democratic National Convention in 2016. He had harsh words for Donald Trump, who had criticized both Muslims and John McCain, the congressman known for his many years as a Vietnam Prisoner of War. After Khan's speech at the DNC, Trump verbally attacked Khan.

I was impressed with Khan's speech and his measured response to Trump's attacks, although reading the speech in the book, it really does appear quite harsh. Still, I found what little I heard about Khan and his story compelling, so I was very excited to get an Advanced Reader Copy of his book, An American Family.

The author goes all the way back to his youth to tell his story. As a child in Pakistan, he lived in poverty but he was determined to become a lawyer. Because of his financial situation, it took a lot of hard work and faith to get to law school and then neither he nor his parents could come up with the money for him to take what we call the Bar Exam (I don't recall if it's called that in Pakistan, but it was clearly the same - a test that allows one to practice law), although a leap of faith and a dollop of courage led to that opportunity. The story of how he acquired his education and the words of wisdom that were repeated to him as a child are fascinating enough alone. But, you also get to read about Khan's love story - how he met his wife, Ghazala, and why her mother wanted her to marry someone else in an arranged marriage but Khizr won out. It's a truly beautiful story.

He talks about the decision to leave the country for a job, rather than staying in Pakistan, where he knew that bribery had a lot to do with the outcome of a trial, and the steps in his career and further education that eventually made his family financially secure. He talks about his three children, their differing personalities, and son Humayun's decision to join the military. You really get to know and admire the family. While Khizr Khan was strict enough that today he'd probably be referred to as a "helicopter parent", it's clear that he and his wife raised children with strong principles and a deep love of their country.

Near the end of the book, the focus is on Humayun and his death - and it is heart-wrenching. The author also talks about how Ghazala eventually worked through her pain by hosting young military recruits for a dinner and giving each a gift, encouraging them in service in spite of her own loss. I could hardly breathe through the last part of the book for all the tears. While his Muslim heritage is a huge part of his life, faith mostly comes into the book in a soft way, in moments when he explains how his beliefs figure into certain decisions and actions, although it's a huge part of his life. This quote, for example, explains how he came to give Ghazala a certain gift that impressed her:

Islam teaches that the Creator made nothing in a cage, and that to release one of His creations back to the wild was an act of kindness and mercy. 

~ from p. 53 of ARC (some changes may have been made to the final print version)

Highly recommended - A deeply moving and admirable story of the author's life and that of his family. Every now and then you read one of those rare memoirs that makes you think, "I wish I knew the author. I would love it if he was my neighbor." That's how I felt while I was reading An American Family. They sound like absolutely lovely, giving people and I wish I knew them. Near the beginning of the book, you find out about how the author discovered the U.S. Constitution and why he carries a copy of it around with him. While he didn't actually intend to end up in the United States, it's quite interesting to read about that early connection and how his understanding of our Constitution has influenced him, over the years, and how his home country compares. A new favorite memoir. I can't think of a single negative thing to say about this book, although it's worth mentioning that it's a very emotional read.

©2017 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

Noor's Story: My Life in District Six by Noor Ebrahim

Noor's Story: My Life in District Six by Noor Ebrahim is a book I bought in Cape Town, South Africa when we went on a tour of District Six, Langa township, and Robben Island (the island on which Nelson Mandela was imprisoned for 18 years). The District Six Museum is pretty much all that's left of the once-thriving community in which Ebrahim once lived.

The name "District Six" has to do with the fact that Cape Town was once subdivided into districts and it just happened to be the sixth district. There's nothing particularly special about the name. But, the district was unique in that it was a melting pot, its residents diverse but living vibrant lives in harmony. In the 1960s, the residents of District Six were informed that their district had been designated an area for whites only and that they'd have to move. However, nothing happened for nearly a decade. Life went on as usual until the government finally got around to forcing people out in the 1970s. And, then they literally bulldozed almost every building.

In Noor's Story, the author talks about his childhood and young adulthood in District Six. Although his family was impoverished, they lived a happy life and always knew that if they were short on money, they could ask the neighbors for a little help and count on them to provide a little bit of bread or vegetables. They would never starve. The district was self-reliant, so while some of the residents commuted to other parts of Cape Town to work, they had everything they needed in District Six - food, schools, churches and mosques, a theater, etc. Noor had a variety of interests including athletics and choir. He talks about various holidays, religious and otherwise, and the parades that everyone looked forward to. And, he tells about how and why he gave up his schooling and sought employment to help finance his siblings' education.

The sad part, of course, is the destruction of the district and the way the community was divided as everyone was forced to move. For some, life was never even remotely the same. Once that community was gone, many of its traditions and connections disappeared, as well. Those who lived in District Six will tell you they believe the district was destroyed because it served the government's purpose to have people of varying backgrounds divided. Apartheid still existed and whites could only stay in power if they encouraged division. Trevor Noah made similar comments about the way blacks were divided into differing factions during Apartheid. It's fascinating and definitely a lesson worth studying.

Highly recommended - If you're interested in what life was like in this unique community, I definitely recommend it. I found myself looking up a lot of words that were unfamiliar (or looking them up again if I'd read them, before - "koeksisters", for example, are a confectionary that looks much like our donuts and I read about them in another book but promptly forgot the word). While sometimes I couldn't find a definition, I found reading about the community so enjoyable that I just shrugged it off and continued when that happened. No biggie. The bottom line was that District Six was a place where people of different colors, religions, and backgrounds lived in joyful harmony. I loved immersing myself in Noor's world.

©2017 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

Born a Crime by Trevor Noah

If you watch The Daily Show, these days, you've probably seen Trevor Noah talk about the fact that his birth during apartheid was a crime. His mother was a black South African, his father a white Swiss/German. As a mixed-race person, he was an outcast in every group - even the coloreds, who were mixed race but generally stuck together. Being mixed race with a black mother was different than having two colored parents; for years, Trevor could not be seen with either his mother or his father without potentially risking a beating or arrest of his mother.

Born a Crime is really a book about race, how a small percentage of people can use hatred and division to rule a larger number of people, and what it was like for Noah to grow up on the fringe, not quite fitting into any group at all. It's not about how he became a comedian who traveled the world and eventually settled in the U.S.  In fact, I hope he'll eventually write that book, as well.

Trevor Noah is a sharp guy, very articulate, and the book is well-written, illuminating, sometimes a bit shocking, and occasionally funny. You can't help but admire his mother's strength of character and the fact that Noah not only survived his crazy childhood but also came out of it with such a tremendous sense of humor and the ability to view his experiences as lessons to build on, rather than enduring pain. I admired him before; I'm in awe of him, now.

Highly recommended - Excellent writing and timely, as Born a Crime shines a light on racial division and how people can be subjugated merely by turning against each other.


©2016 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery  or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

My Family and Other Animals by Gerald Durrell

I'm going to do my catch-up posts backwards, last book read first, because I think it would be best to write about what's freshest in my mind, rather than adding to the backlog of books that I can't recall much about. I finished reading My Family and Other Animals by Gerald Durrell, this morning. The cover shown is my favorite available cover. The one I have is in a bound book called The Corfu Trilogy but I'm not reading all three books at once, so I'll write about them individually, as I finish each of the books.

My Family and Other Animals by Gerald Durrell tells about Durrell's family, their move from England to Corfu, and many enchanting tales about their adventures, mishaps, and the exploration of the island by young Gerald, who was then somewhere between 8 and 10 years old. I bought The Corfu Trilogy because I've been enjoying The Durrells in Corfu on PBS and wanted to read more about the family. I was already familiar with Durrell, although I've never read him, because I bought a copy of one of his other books, The Overloaded Ark, many years ago. My husband read it and told me it was a terrific book but I kept putting off reading it and it's still on the good shelves (probably 20 years post-purchase). I considered reading that, instead, but decided that the whole point was that I wanted to read about the family's time in Corfu. I can read The Overloaded Ark, later.

Good decision. I cannot even begin to describe how entertaining Gerald's writing is. Huzzybuns told me The Overloaded Ark was funny and I've never forgotten that, but you really have to read My Family and Other Animals to understand how someone can not only do a fabulous job of describing the various characters in his life with humor and affection but also make hunting for and examining animals that are often pretty revolting sound intriguing. Durrell had a singular talent for description, dialogue, and retelling of events in a way that entertains. My Family and Other Animals will definitely go down as a favorite 2016 read and a classic worth holding onto.

My Family and Other Animals was first published in 1955 and The Durrells in Corfu is actually the second television adaptation. I only know this because, as I closed the book, I decided to look up the DVD to see if it was reasonably priced. The reviews were shockingly polarized and I was curious about that, so I read quite a few of them to find out why. It seems the original series stuck very close to the book itself, while The Durrells in Corfu is more of a series that's based upon the books. I knew this, of course, as I read stories like that of the scorpion (which bites Leslie in the TV series but not in the book) and the murderer who befriends young Gerry (but without Mrs. Durrell feeling obligated to look into his background).

There's also plenty of conflict in the book but I agree that the Durrells often come off as more snappy and rude in the series than in the book. Mrs. Durrell, in particular, is an incredibly relaxed individual, easily persuaded to do her children's bidding. In the book, they live in not one but three different villas because one of the children periodically encourages her to move; but, she comes off as a worrier and her character is the unexpected focus of the stories in the series. So, the reviewers are right that the new series is quite different from the book, but that didn't bother me because I was already enjoying the TV series and in the book I could see the roots of the characters, if not the exact replication of them. I hope that makes sense.

Highly recommended - One of the most entertaining nonfiction reads I've ever found, the kind of book that you want to shove into all of your friends' hands. It is such fun. I would dive directly into the next book in the trilogy, if not for the fact that I have some nonfiction ARCs that I need to get to. It will be interesting to see how long I can keep from opening the second book, though. The writing is that good.


©2016 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery  or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

Girl in the Woods by Aspen Matis and a Fiona Friday pic

Yes, it's true that I posed Girl in the Woods in the middle of a nandina in my yard (and then came inside scratching).

I just finished Girl in the Woods by Aspen Matis, last night, and immediately thought, "I've got to write about this, right now," because I'm at the point that I've read so many books in such a short time span that I'm beginning to have trouble keeping them all straight. So, I may work my way backwards for a bit.

Girl in the Woods is the memoir of a young lady who was raped on her second night of college and how she eventually walked the entire 2,650-mile Pacific Crest Trail from Mexico to Canada. In her words:

I was on a grand walk hoping to discover my best path forward, my strength, my place in a frightening world. 

~p. 92

I mentioned the rape up front because it's the central issue and when she mentioned she'd been raped to people, early on, she was blown off or told it was her fault -- a common theme amongst friends who've been raped and certainly in news stories. So, let's just acknowledge it here and now: the author was the victim of a crime, a violation, and she did nothing to deserve it, despite what the world told her. Her family did a lot of hiking and Aspen had hiked part of the Pacific Crest Trail before college, so it was only natural that the trail was the place to which she retreated to do her pondering.

A little background, though, is important. Aspen had an unusual (maybe "weird" is a better word) upbringing in that her mother didn't want to let Aspen, then known as Debby, grow up. To that end, she coddled her all the way through high school. Aspen was so over-protected that she didn't know how to dress herself or brush her own hair. That's hard to fathom but I know some people find it difficult to believe that one can go off to college not knowing how to do laundry and there were plenty of us who learned by turning white clothing other colors because we hadn't learned to sort.

In other words, it's important to work at not being judgmental when you read Aspen's story because her experience and her lack of ability to cope was not her fault. And, more importantly, it was not her fault that she was raped.

The vast majority of the book focuses on the hike up the Pacific Crest Trail, her sexual experiences and friendships, the dangers she faced and the trail magic and trail angels that saved her from herself. There's a nice photo section in the middle of the book with pictures of Aspen, her childhood paintings, scenery on the trail, gallon bottles of water that saved her when she walked one stretch completely unprepared, and the man she met toward the end of the trail (whom she married). I think the most important thing that you get out of the book is that when a person is traumatized, sometimes it's important for her to find her own way through the pain. Her family considered her selfish and she was often reckless but she got out of the experience what she needed.

Even more important is the distinction between rape and consent, which is clearly show through her experiences. She did a lot of testing - getting close to men and then saying no to prove to herself that she really was not responsible for a rapist's refusal to stop when she told him to, that it was possible for her to have control over her own body.

You do have to wade through a lot of verbiage to get to the point, though. Much as I appreciated the importance of Aspen's memoir, I found it a bit overwrought and tiresome. And, yet, I wanted to know the answers. What would walking over 2,600 miles do for her? Would she emerge unscathed or injure herself in the process (it's a dangerous walk, in many ways)? Would she find strength in the accomplishment alone or need to keep testing men and constantly trying to convince herself that she was beautiful, talented, in control?

Iffy on recommendation - As important as I believe personal accounts like Aspen's are, I must be honest and tell you that I found the author's wordiness and constant fretting about whether or not she was pretty enough, talented enough, etc., wearying. It's a bit self-indulgent, in other words, always a danger with memoirs, although I know some people don't mind that as much as I do. I personally think a full 100 pages could have been cut from the book. Having said that, I think the importance of the book lies in how clearly is shows the distinction between a violent crime and the way sex ought to be. And, you also have to admire the author for daring to take on such a huge challenge when she had been so fiercely protected for so long. That can't have been easy, even if hiking was something she'd always found comfortable.

On to Fiona Friday, a picture of Fiona gazing out into the wilds of our backyard:

©2016 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery  or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

Feather Brained by Bob Tarte

I reviewed Feather Brained by Bob Tarte at Goodreads and Amazon (the latter at the author's request) so I felt a little tapped out on reviewing the book after that first round. Sorry, Bob. I don't cut and paste. All three reviews are a shade different. Of course, I had to review it here for my permanent records, once I got over myself.

A door had burst open to reveal a secret world that had been hiding in plain sight. These birds were the mouthpieces for the seasons. They were what we had lost when we learned to speak. They were themselves and nothing more in the same way that we were ourselves and something less. Just by being, they made me happy. 

~p. 50

All of this new information about birds was a good news/bad news thing. The good news was that habitat, behavior, species migration dates, and thousand-mile detours all played major roles in birding, so that finding birds wasn't just a matter of blundering into them. The bad news was that habitat, behavior, species migration dates, and thousand-mile detours all played major roles in birding, and with so much to absorb, I was better off just hoping to blunder into birds. 

~p. 65

Feather Brained is a memoir that tells of author Bob Tarte's interest in birds, how it developed, and why it took him several attempts before he regularly began going on field trips to locate interesting birds while hunting for a rare bird (not a specific rare bird but any rare bird). It took me a long time to read the book because I kept stopping to Google various birds as I was reading about them. Fortunately, about halfway through the book, Bob informed me that he has a photo section dedicated to the birds he discusses in the book at his website. Here's the easy link:

Feather Brained photo section at Bob Tarte's website

Each link takes you to two chapters' worth of photos. Fortunately, what I'd already read was so vividly described that I had no trouble remembering what the chapters were about when I belatedly flipped through the photo sections.

I've read some of Bob Tarte's other books and loved them, so I was thrilled when Bob asked if I'd like to review Feather Brained. 

Feather Brained is lighthearted, informative, and filled with Bob's trademark humor. In Feather Brained, he admires the encyclopedic knowledge of birders while describing his own efforts to learn and making it sound like he's a complete disaster. I've been following Bob on Facebook for a while and I'm impressed with his knowledge of birds, so don't let him fool you.

The two things I loved most about Feather Brained were his growing understanding of animal life  (something I've mentioned in reviews of his other books) -- the surprising intelligence and memory of birds, for example, which were aided by his wife's agreement to help with bird rehabbing -- and his relationships with his wife, Linda, and his somewhat curmudgeonly friend, Bill (whom he refers to as "book character Bill Holm" on Facebook). I was well into adulthood before I got over my misunderstanding of animals as purely creatures of instinct, myself, so I always appreciate reading about Bob's learning experience, which bears some similarities to my own. I also absolutely adored what amounted to Bob and Linda's love story. And, Bill Holm is a hoot. While Bill is a little wary of the obsessive side of birding, Bob seems gobsmacked by birders' knowledge. He does, however, share some hilarious interactions with them, which are not always flattering but definitely will make you smile.

Recommended - Subdued by comparison with Bob's other books, humor-wise, but every bit as entertaining, Feather Brained made me appreciate the effort that goes into identifying birds. And, it made me feel better about never being quite sure what kind of hawk I'm looking at, if they don't have the obvious red tail. Whew! I feel so much better about that.

Scanning the frozen wastes with binocs I caught a ripple of brown and white on the ground. Gotta be a bunting, I decided. Switching to the scope, I twiddled with the focus knob to sharpen the view of a Snickers wrapper impaled on a twig.

~p. 106 

Ha! I guess that's similar to the hawks I've spotted that turned out, upon closer observation with the use of a 300mm camera lens, to be plastic bags snagged on a high branch. You might be surprised how often that happens.

Click through to read my reviews of past books by Bob Tarte:

Enslaved by Ducks
Kitty Cornered

I have not yet read Fowl Weather, even though I mentioned wanting to, when I reviewed Enslaved by Ducks. That's because it's partly about dealing with his mother's Alzheimer's and I was so stung by my mother's death that I couldn't bear to read about a mother in decline, for a long time. It was long enough ago, though, that it's no longer an issue. I really need to track down a copy of Fowl Weather.

Also of note, there is a set of discussion questions in the back of the book, and that's where Bob really let his sense of humor run loose. I closed the book laughing at the final question:

Bob says about his favorite bird, "No bird was a better bird than a bird I saw with Linda." Isn't he a prince? What is the extent of your injuries from swooning over this line? 

What a great way to end a book!


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