PHAYVANH LUEKHAMHAN

Hardball by Sara Paretsky


My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I won one of the Goodreads giveaways and received an advance copy of Hardball in the mail in September–my first Sara Paretsky novel! I still consider myself new to the mystery genre (most of it limited to Agatha Christie books), and so was not familiar with the V.I. Warshawski series.

This book is a good introduction, since Vic makes sure to strew background info throughout the narrative. It’s done pretty matter-of-factly, and sometimes gave me the impression that the author (or narrator) was aware of the need to catch new readers up to speed. But do we really need to know that she’s divorced? It doesn’t further the plot any.

The plot was intricate, and unfolded with a fine pacing, the way a movie version might play out. The people in this book are all kinds–street bums and politicians, artists and racists. It is one the pleasures about this book–the many people who are involved. That, and the deeper underlying story of the lives of Chicago blacks during a riotous time of racial conflict. I wished that had been explored more deeply. But as the narrator was only 9 then, and a child of a cop, there was only so much she knew. The story of Lamont Gadsden, the missing teenager, was infinitely more interesting and real than anything Vic was doing.

But at times, Vic acts as tour guide to her city, going on about the slowness of traffic on the highway, and where things used to be, how they used to be. It’s too much distraction for a book already crammed full of unnecessaries: the vacation to Italy, a blockhead cousin, her PDAs and Apple computers. I sensed the story was trying very hard to be modern, by telling us what brand this or that is–none of which serves to illustrate anything about the story or people. There are several mentions (but no reflections)of Barak Obama as President, which is annoying in a book about race relations, and it only serves to date the book.

What kept me up all night reading it was the chase–once Petra’s gone, and the bad guys have Vic on the run, then it’s full-tilt suspense–through to the end.

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The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer


My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Unfortunately, I did not fall in love with Juliet, our protagonist, as most everyone else in this book did, and I cannot find her love for these people genuine. Fascination, yes. The historical chapter the islanders lived through–and readily told to Juliet–is fascinating, and the smaller stories within it also add depth to a common history.

What bothers me the most is that Juliet is so taken by the life of Elizabeth,(founder of the Society, and who was forced off the island) that she not only finds many similarities in their lives, but assumes her life completely in the end: adopting her daughter, living in her house, even being loved by the same man. No one on the island thought this was weird? Or uncomfortable?

Aside from all of Juliet’s many character flaws, this book does not convince me that she is a good writer. Throughout, she excuses the success of the Izzy columns as conforming to the publisher’s request, and not what she’s capable of writing. Her letters though (the only writing we ever get to read of hers) are as flippant, self-centered, gossipy, and contrived as I imagine the published columns were. As the reader, we are not treated to any excerpts of the Bronte biography, or the Times article, though the islanders apparently were allowed to read them. There is no evidence Juliet is capable of greater things.

This I fault mostly to the writers, and their lack of artistry. A better writer would have given us everything–or at least made Juliet’s letters an exquisite pleasure to read (she is a writer after all). Isola’s journal inclusion at the end was a cop-out. It wouldn’t have done to have Juliet write a long letter to her dearest childhood friends (whom she’s been corresponding with this whole time) about something so important?

I get it, though. Guernsey is supposed to be a little paradise. Where no one suffers from PTSD, and all the folks are friendly as can be. Storybook. A place outsiders fall in love with and want for themselves.

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About Workshop Poems: These are drafts I’m revising. One a month. Please feel free to comment. And check back in throughout the month to see how I’ve progressed with it.

January 2010 original:

Brother(s)

We had our separate twin beds, sharing the room
with purple plush bears and the thundering monsters
we named from under our covers at night.
With satisfied stomachs of rice, my voice carried the both of us
into scarlet, clovered dreaming.

( I did not know)

Through our window, the dual aroma of lilac and mint slippered in
as firebugs fall down, petite stars
gilding the dusk of our game, between blue pine
and heaven, between
(I give up) and ollie oxen.

(what have we got to get her?)(we got a name.)

Yet I knew. The cinema’s flickering told it this way:
hearts will cleave in half (or thirds),
portions of which are no longer ours to hold.
I knew it this way: teddy bears grow up, fall apart.
The tales you asked from me ended like this: Together.

(we determine the inkblot’s fold)

Namesharing, our last halves equal (beginning the same).
I hurled my books at you and still you broke no ribs.
I abandoned you to the streets, yet homeward still.
Still. Homeward still. Still, my heart
is cleaving.

Working revision copy:

Brother(s)

We had our separate twin beds, sharing the room
with purple plush bears and the thundering monsters
we named from under our covers at night.
With satisfied stomachs of rice, my voice carried the both of us
into scarlet, clovered dreaming.

( I did not know)

Through our window, the dual aroma of lilac and mint slippered in
as firebugs fall fell down, petite stars
gildinggilded the dusk of our game, between blue pine
and heaven, between
(I give up) and ollie oxen.

(what have we got to get her?)(we got a name.)

Yet I knew. The cinema’s flickering told it this way:
hearts will cleave in half (or thirds),
portions of which are no longer ours to hold.
I knew it this way: teddy bears grow up, fall apart.
The tales you asked from me ended like this: Together.

(we determine the inkblot’s fold)

Namesharing, our last halves equal (beginning the same).
I hurled my books at you and still you broke no ribs.
I abandoned you to the streets, yet homeward still.
Still. Homeward still. Still, my heart
is cleaving.

New Version:

[check back later]

Let’s look back through the dream diary of this year and see what the common themes are…

The modes of transportation have been mostly walking, running, or car/bus.  Usually, I’ve been going to meet someone, and come to a fork in the road, and/or get separated.  My travels are rarely fulfilled.  Once I crashed a semi into a stone church.  I did once find a time-travel portal (which I have found before), but did not use it.  It was protected by an alligator-type creature.

Themes of oppression still manifest as Nazi imprisonment and slavery of the American 1800s.  In both situations, I have tried to escape, but awoke before I succeeded.  A new kind of imprisonment took place recently, as I toiled away in a human refugee work camp on some alien planet.  This time, escape was very real.  We rose up through our collective power and we were allowed to board a diplomatic plane.  I don’t remember us getting off the ground, though.

Alligators have only shown themselves in a few dreams, though they have been quite fierce, even killing one of my companions.   They are usually very large and dinosaur-like.  Otherwise, the animals in my dreams are often small black canine and feline strays.   I have encountered poisonous frogs and scorpions which grow in proportion to their anger.  Once I got chased down by the neighbor’s yak, which spied my futile attempts to escape notice.  Another time, three spit-roasted pigs came back to life.

As for literature-related adventures, I have been in woodsy settings inspired by the Narnia chronicles, I entered a passionate affair with Ernest Hemingway in Spain, and witnessed Beouwolf and Grendl tossing jokes like old friends, as they spirited down a winding dirt path.

I attended an early-morning book group where we drank martinis, a literature festival on the Keene State Campus, and suffered my usual mind-blanks onstage during poetry slams.

The books that exist only in my dream world include Jan Frazier’s beautiful poetry book, decorated with victorian-style florals.  It was priced at $104, published by Marlowe & Co., or M__ & Marlowe.  Jon Barlow also self-published a small collection of picture books when he was a young boy.  His brother, my boyfriend, presented him with a scrapbook collection of them on his 18th birthday.  Titles included “I Like Being a _____ (animal?), But Not When it’s _____ Hunting Time”, and “War”, published by The Last Press.  There’s also a new-ish Garry Trudeau book I had been trying to find.

New this year: I have a few near-death occassions, including being bludgeoned in a Quidditch game, after which I snapped to lucidity.  Once, I was diagnosed with life-threatening cancer.  All this is to say that my dreams are getting scarier.

Another unexpected theme is underground tunnels or mazes.  In my dream of an impending monster attack (a repeat), we live in a warren-type settlement.  In some dreams, they are traps, but mostly they are domestic places, either long abandoned or rediscovered.

Lastly, a few nonsense quotes, names, and other quizzical things:

• “Render for me the gorgeousness of Brattleboro, as I do for you.  Come on town, Wake up!” — Bob Peed
• www._____.umcom.
• “Sunday they don’t call me / Monday they call me to school /” — lyric from a Gospel song.
• Characters names: Mee-Moon, White Star, Connie Delgado, and Bananaman