I'm In a Book Club!

Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood
Trevor Noah
Anchor Canada

I've been struggling to write about this book for over a week now. Biography isn't really my jam and since I typically read to get away from the world, I rarely venture into the land of non-fiction. Why the exception? Well, one of my BFFs is a little worried about my sanity during lockdown, so she invited me to join her family book club. Hello Trevor Noah.

I think I liked this book despite the fact that I found the tone to be a bit condescending. Some of his stories are laugh out loud funny and I have to give him credit for trying to tackle racism head on. He's not always successful though -- the discussion of apartheid lacks nuance. I also found the narration to be a bit condescending. He tries hard to convince the reader of the "otherness" that gives his permission to  talk openly, honestly and objectively about race. His views, however, often seem colonial and reductive. 

If we put the discussion of racism aside, the book is also about Noah's "it's us against the world" relationship with his mom. If I had to pick a single word to describe her it would be indomitable. His choice of anecdotes really highlight how the two of them survived a hard-scrabble life under some very difficult circumstances. His tough love upbringing makes for some very funny moments and I feel lucky to have had the glimpse into his childhood. 

Born a Crime gets three polyglots out of five.

Watching the Detectives

The Keeper of Lost Causes
Jussi Adler-Olsen
Dutton

I picked up my first Department Q novel on a whim. My cousin Emily had been reading them for a few years and when I told her I was all caught up on Ian Hamilton's Ava Lee detective series, she recommended that I give Jussi Adler-Olsen a whirl. I am totally addicted.

Carl Mørck was one of Copenhagen best homicide detectives until a case he was working went sideways. During the course of the investigation, he and his colleagues are ambushed; one of his partners is killed, the other is left a quadriplegic. Already emotionally struggling with his failure to protect his team, Mørck learns that he's been kicked off the homicide squad. Instead, he's been assigned to the newly formed Department Q -- the place where cold cases go to die. Mørck's not quite ready to sit back, relax, and glide into retirement. With some prodding from his assistant Assad, the two become engaged with a missing person's case -- one that just might prove that he hasn't lost his edge.

Darkly funny, moody, and intense, The Keeper of Lost Causes will definitely keep you on the edge of your seat. It's as much a thriller as a mystery and I can guarantee that once you start one, you'll be reading them all. Four Scandi investigators out of five.

Happy New Year

How long has it been, anyway?  Five years?  Ten?  I suppose I could check the date in the last post, but it doesn't really matter. I'm backish and that's good enough for now.

A lot has happened since we last hung out. I've moved back to the city (or Canada, as my friend Tim likes to say) and in ways, it does feel a little like I've returned after a long exile. Been here a year now and the first couple of months were wonderful. Walks down to the beach, streetcar rides to Queen West, and the food. Yum! I cannot tell you how happy I was to be back in a place where you could get decent take out past 8:00 pm. Alas, Covid struck in March and the world became a different place.
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Some of you may ask why I came back at all. To be candid, I needed to hit the reset button on me. Work was going well from my firm's perspective, but most everything else about me was in shambles and I felt trapped in life I didn't want to lead.  Wake up at gross o'clock on Monday mornings, fly to DC, work ridiculous hours, return Thursdays (also at gross o'clock), struggle through Friday client deliverables, admin and meetings until it was time go to prison (more about that later), come home, take chemo, barf my way through Saturday until it was back for more volunteer time at the jail, watch <insert sport here> on Sundays, do laundry and go to bed by 9 pm in the naïve hope that gross o'clock wouldn't seem so bad. Oh. Did I mention that some of this frenetic behaviour was spurred on by the fact that my best friend fell back in love with his ex and disappeared from my life completely?  The only way I managed to cope was to keep myself so busy that I didn't have time to think. If I stopped, I cried. I was in a very bad way.

So here we are at the start of my second year back in town. While I wouldn't say the move miraculously transformed me, I think my family and close friends would argue that I no longer seem like I'm constantly on the verge. In fact, I know that I'm feeling more like my old self because I'm reading again.  It's been a journey for sure and I had to trick myself into it.  I started out by getting a three-month subscription to a reading box so I would feel compelled to read the novels. Oh my god what drivel. The accompanying swag was often way better than the book.

Then, on a whim, I got a subscription to Audible. I'd go out onto the balcony, rock gently in the hammock and drift away to the classics. It was a wonderful way to ease myself back into capital L literature.  

Where does all this blather leave us?  I am going to commit to a year of reviews.  Like before I'll give you author and publisher, but this time I'll also include my mode of consumption -- Kindle, Paper, Audible.  I'm also going to try come up with a new rating system that works for both text and performance.  I keep wondering if an audio book has more in common with a play than a novel.  Thoughts for another day.

Once again, I wish you all a very happy 2021.  Looking forward to this year's journey with you. I can only imagine what we'll find.

DES

Live Before You Die

Into the Wild

Jon Krakauer

Knopf

A few months ago, one of my friends asked me if I would be interested in doing a 100 book challenge with her.  We scoured all sorts of lists and websites looking for the right combination of classics, genres, authors, and subject matter.  Most seemed a little too conventional for our tastes and as my friend pointed out, it is rather hard coming up with a list of must-reads when one of the participants was a lit major in school.  Fair enough.  So, we decided to cobble together our own syllabus.  Sarah came up with the categories, and each of us is responsible for selecting 50 books.  Fun, right?

My first selection was TERRIBLE!  I can only assume that it was an expectation thing.  A number of years ago, I read Into Thin Air -- Krakauer's personal account of a disastrous day on Mount Everest -- and loved, loved, loved it.  While I found the story of Christopher McCandless' journey into the wild moving and could relate to his need to reinvent himself, I hated how Krakauer inserted himself into the narrative and made the book about him and how he related to McCandless' story versus just about the story itself.  A matter of personal taste, I suppose.
Check back here for occasional updates.  I think Sarah and I are going to create a new blog to document our reading odyssey.  I'll link to it once we're ready to go.  Next review ... The Leftovers by Tom Perotta.  I have some catching up to do!