17. The Book of Lost Things by John Connolly

Not a bad little book. It was a fast read and I enjoyed most of it. The ending was "sweet" in a warm, nice way and not a sugary, sticky way.

The book is about David, a young English boy whose mother is dying at the start of the book. Soon after she dies he begins to have attacks, where he blacks out but remembers the fluttering of flags and images of castles. He hears books murmuring to him. His dad moves him out to the country to avoid the dangers of the German bombing attacks on London. Things get really weird after his dad remarries and a new baby brother joins the family.

One night he runs off into the garden and makes his way through a crack in the wall and finds himself in a dangerous new world: Bleeding, murmuring trees; a caring Woodsman who escorts him to the King's castle; vicious half wolf/half human creatures who want to eat him whole; and an errant knight on a quest to find out what happened to his love. And David is being pursued by the Crooked Man who wants to use David to replace the old King with David.

What I enjoyed the most was the way Connolly weaved the elements of other fairy tales into his story. Little Red Riding Hood is there, though a little bit more worldly than we recall, and so too is the Gingerbread House of Hansel and Gretel, also not quite the same way.

The atmosphere of the book was cool, but ultimately not as captivating as the setting of The Golden Compass novels. I liked the book a lot and it was just short enough at 339 pages, or fast enough, that I didn't get sick of it.

16. "The Crucible" by Arthur Miller (not Henry)

First of all, Marilyn Monroe didn't marry Henry Miller.

Second, this was a damn fine play. There's some subtlety that is over looked, I think, because of our familiarity with the theme and plot of the play, but Miller has a nice touch, especially with the character of Hale. John Proctor is a little over the top, and that takes away from some of the other characterizations. But don't we all know an Abigail Williams? And don't we all try to escape her clutches? And don' t we, sometimes, run from Abigail right into the arms of another Abigail? Blameth not the John Proctor.

And certainly we are a Nation of Mary Warrens. In fact, from now on, whenever I refer to these United States, I shall also call upon the spirit of Mary Warren. I hope you enjoy it, you MaryWarrenlanders (and Canadians).

15. The Scarlet Letter by Nate Hawthorne

It's damn difficult to read books outside the curriculum I teach these days, but I am slowly working my way through a few fiction books right now: The System of the World, the final book in the Baroque Cycle; The Book of Lost Things by John Connolly. And a few non-fiction ones: Instant Weather Forecasting by not the Zen-Master Alan Watts; and the Boatowner's Electrical Handbook by Charlie Wing.

But I have asked you here to tell you about the glorious writing that is Nate's. I had not read The Scarlet Letter before reading it to teach it. Nothing better to clarify your concentration than having to get in front of 25 16 year olds and lead a book discussion. The AP Language class read the book, and we looked at it both as a piece of fiction, and as an argument. That Hawthorne was critiquing the Puritans in the plight of Hester, Chillingsworth, and Dimmesdale, and even criticizing his own ancestors (his grandfather of some great-kind, was one of the judges in the Salem Witch Trials, a fact that shames Nate so much that he adds the W to his last name to put some distance between the two of them. Old Judge Hathorne is a character in "The Crucible."). We looked at the monologues as editorials and Nate's language - his syntax and diction.

It was a fascinating way to read a book with teenagers, to really take a close look at the words in the text. For example, in the 200 pages of the novel NH uses the word ignomony 21 times. So we examine why that word, and why in those places. I really enjoy close reading and my best classes in college where the ones where we took a critical eye to word choice and the multiple meanings of words. (I realize that that close reading lead many a folk to the evils of the post-modern, but I found it intellectually satisfying right to that threshold.) I also learned that the kids, or at least these kids, will get as nerdy about language as you make it safe to be so.

A section I especially loved, and it will come as no surprise to my fellow Wordsworthians, was when little Pearl was in the forest, and the woods seemed to welcome her: the melancholy brook, the birds, the wildflowers that called out to her - I never knew Hawthorne to have such a delicate eye for nature and the sympathetic, in-tune feelings of his fellow transcendentalists. There are sentences, paragraphs even, where Hawthorne uses all of the descriptive finesse of Hank Thoreau.

Welcome Julia Claire

Lucas and Selena had their baby! Julia Claire was born this morning around 9.30. Seven pounds and four ounces, and about 19 inches. Tall and thin and cute as can be. She is a giant compared to her big brother on his birthday.

I visited her this evening and then went to see Jacob. He's a holy terror, running around, throwing anything he can get his hands on, and generally getting into stuff no matter how secure it looks. He's just big enough to start wrestling and rough-housing with. Fun.

what am I doing wrong?

I have a rice cooker that I use often to cook all kinds of different rice. But no matter what kind of rice I am cooking, I find I have the same problem - a lot of rice sticking to the bottom of the rice cooker. It really cuts down on my yield and is a waste of food. Am I doing something wrong? I am following the rules that came with the rice cooker for the rice/water ratio.

the coolest thing: October

Little people in London, just tryin' to live.

two more poems

If I ever have a funeral, or even a memorial service of some kind, I'd like this poem to be read:

Do not stand at my grave and weep,
I am not there, I do not sleep.

I am a thousand winds that blow.
I am the diamond glint on snow.
I am the sunlight on ripened grain.
I am the gentle autumn rain.

When you wake in the morning hush,
I am the swift, uplifting rush
Of quiet birds in circling flight.
I am the soft starlight at night.

Do not stand at my grave and weep.
I am not there, I do not sleep.
Do not stand at my grave and cry.
I am not there, I did not die!

-Mary Frye (1932)

and "A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning" by John Donne

Meeting at Night, by Robert Browning - 1845

Meeting at Night

THE gray sea and the long black land;
And the yellow half-moon large and low;
And the startled little waves that leap
In fiery ringlets from their sleep,
As I gain the cove with pushing prow,
And quench its speed i' the slushy sand. 

Then a mile of warm sea-scented beach;
Three fields to cross till a farm appears;
A tap at the pane, the quick sharp scratch
And blue spurt of a lighted match,
And a voice less loud, thro' its joys and fears,
Than the two hearts beating each to each!

14. The Confusion by Neal Stephenson

Book two of the Baroque Cycle, The Confusion, was my favorite of the two I've read. This one was a lot of swashbuckling naval adventure. Most of the 800ish page long book deals with Jack Shaftoe and his efforts to get rich and get back to England. And the main action takes place far from Europe, though we do check in on Eliza, married now and having babies, and the Natural Philosophers. This book deals more with economics and money than Quicksilver and less with the fine details of European politics.

More so in this book than the other I found myself asking, "why are we spending so much time on this piece of the adventure?" But as I said earlier, Stephenson is a mad genius and I found myself apologizing. I actually like the length of the books, rich detail and lots of characters and interplay. No action happens in Stephenson's world that doesn't have a corresponding reaction/s.

I look forward to reading the third installment, the final 900 pages or so, and I know I will feel a loss when the story comes to an end. There's still Cryptonomicon, though, which takes place in more modern times, with descendants of the Baroque characters.

I recommend, it's the better of Book 1 and 2.

13. Quicksilver by Neal Stephenson

I loved Snow Crash so much I decided to get some more Stephenson. Quicksilver is book one of the Baroque Cycle.

The book is divided into three sections - the first deals with England's Natural Philosophers of the Royal Society like the fictional Daniel Waterhouse and his room mate the real Isaac Newton and their pals. The second section introduces two other main characters Half-Cocked Jack Shaftoe a Vagabond and crusading mercenary soldier who is suffering from the French Pox (syphilis), and Eliza who is from the fictional island of Qwghlm and has found herself in the harem of the Sultan.

Clocking in at just over 900 pages, Quicksilver would be difficult for me to summarize. I will say that I thoroughly enjoyed the last two sections of the book. I really had to wonder why Stephenson included the first section dealing with some obscure topics and people. But as I read on I realized that the Baroque Era, which just preceded the Enlightenment, was dominated by the investigation of the natural world. The conclusions of these philosopher scientists rocked the world of religion, politics, and science.

One other interesting technique Stephenson uses is that he starts the story in the middle, we see Waterhouse living in Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1713. He is asked to come back to England to help settle a long-simmering conflict between Leibniz and Newton over who discovered the calculus. So the frame is set that most of the tale is trying to catch up with the first few chapters (and in fact, after I finished the second novel I reread the first section of the first book again, and now I'm convinced Stephenson is a genius writer).

The second and third drops the Natural Philosophers altogether and picks up with Jack outside the siege of Vienna, about to invade the city with some army he has hired on to fight for. After he goes chasing after an ostrich (figuring the feathers are the best plunder he stands to gain as a lowly foot-soldier), he stumbles across one of the Sultan's men killing all of the girls in the harem. He puts a stop to that and rescues Eliza. She turns out to be from Qwghlm, an island off the north west coast of England. When Eliza was little she and her mother were captured and made the servants of a French noble. She was then traded for some horses and found herself in the harem. So Jack and Eliza escape on Turk, this great war horse that Jack steals. They go on some amazing misadventures, but it turns out that Eliza is a genius for making deals. She wheels and deals and makes a small fortune. Unfortunately Jack, in order to gain her love, decided to engage in a bit of trading for himself and invests in a slave ship. Eliza, a former slave, gets mad at Jack for perpetuating the slave trade and harpoons Jack before he can make it off the ship and make it up to her. He comes to in the middle of the ocean just as their ship is coming under attack from Barbary Corsairs. Jack is rowing a slave galley as Quicksilver ends.

I'm leaving out so much: cryptography, machinations of the French court, letters between Natural philosophers, machinations of the Natural Philosophers, James II, Louis XIV, Catholics, Protestants, Germans, and the Dutch (including of course, William of Orange).

I recommend.

Dear Persuasion

NOW finale to the shore!
Now, land and life, finale, and farewell!
Now Voyager depart! (much, much for thee is yet in store;)
Often enough hast thou adventur’d o’er the seas,
Cautiously cruising, studying the charts, 5
Duly again to port, and hawser’s tie, returning:
—But now obey, thy cherish’d, secret wish,
Embrace thy friends—leave all in order;
To port, and hawser’s tie, no more returning,
Depart upon thy endless cruise, old Sailor! 10

Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass