Recent holiday reading

I always manage to get a lot of reading done while I'm on vacation, and this past holiday season was no exception. :) 

I actually read "The Wilder Life:  My Adventures in the Lost World of Little House on the Prairie"  by Wendy McClure before I left on Christmas vacation. I had been searching for a copy of "Pioneer Girl" -- a newly released annotated version of Laura Ingalls Wilder's original unpublished memoir, which served as the foundation for her Little House series of books -- but it appears impossible to get in Canada at the moment. :p  "The Wilder Life" has been in my to-read pile for awhile and recommended to me by other Wilder fans, so it seemed like a good compromise.

McClure rediscovered Wilder's books -- which she had loved as a child -- as an adult. Thus begins her obsession with exploring what she calls "Laura World" -- the world of the books as well as the world of the author and the sometimes jarring differences she finds between them. Not only does she visit every place where Wilder lived during her lifetime (in Wisconsin, Kansas, Minnesota, Iowa, South Dakota and Missouri -- as well as Almanzo Wilder's boyhood home in upstate New York, the setting for "Farmer Boy"), she learns how to do things such as churn butter and twist hay into sticks for burning (as Laura & her family did during "The Long Winter"). In one memorable chapter, she and her husband go on a rural "homesteading" weekend to immerse themselves in learning pioneer skills. They wind up leaving early when they realize their companions for the weekend are a cult-like group of apocalyptic survivalists.

As an stillbirth mother, I was reminded in this book that Laura's mother, Laura herself and her only daughter, Rose, all lost baby boys at birth or in infancy.  Rose never had any other children. None of Laura's sisters (Mary, Carrie and Grace) had children either, so the Charles Ingalls family tree ends with Laura's daughter -- just as the branch of the family I grew up in will end with me and my childfree-by-choice sister. I also felt a pang of recognition near the end of the book where, watching little girls in bonnets in Walnut Grove, Minnesota, McClure writes: 

Watching the girls with their families made me think about something else, too. I knew my decision to make this trip was  in some small way informed by the fact that Chris and I had decided not to have kids. In other words, I knew that if I wanted to see these places, I'd have to go for myself;  I wouldn't ever be sharing the experience with a daughter, the way Little House fans often do. A friend of mine who similarly lacks the childbearing instinct once said, "I don't want kids because I don't want kids," and it's always made perfect sense to me. I've never really regretted being childless, but it started to feel different after my mother died, in a way I couldn't describe.  

But here in Walnut Grove, I knew what it was:  I felt invisible sometimes. Not ignored, but anomalous and ghostly. I wasn't the girl anymore, and I wasn't the ma.

Despite these insights, I must confess, I wanted to like this book more than I ultimately did. I did like it, but I didn't LOVE it;  I would probably give it about three stars. There is some interesting stuff here, and a few tidbits I had not known or had forgotten about Wilder's life -- but between the back & forthing between the Laura of the books, the real Laura, and McClure's own story, the story rambles a bit, and the ending, where we (and McClure) finally figure out the real, underlying motivation behind her Laura quest, falls just a little bit flat.  Ultimately, I think I would have gotten more out of "Pioneer Girl."

If you are a fan of the Little House books or TV show, and want a bit of an introduction to the author and the truth of her life vs her writing, you might enjoy this book.

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I found "I Will Marry George Clooney (...By Christmas)" by Tracy Bloom on display with other holiday-related books just before leaving for the holidays. "There comes a time in every woman's life when the only answer is to marry George Clooney,"  the tagline reads. As a big fan of George myself, how could I resist, with a title & premise like that?? lol 

This is chick-lit with a British accent and a celebrity tie-in -- extremely light and silly, totally unrealistic at some points and completely predictable at others -- but sometimes, light & silly is what you want & need from a book. It was a quick and easy read and, overall, I enjoyed it.

The plot:  Michelle, 36, is a gourmet chef by training who once dreamed of a career in London, but became pregnant and now works at a dead-end job in a chicken factory in her hometown to support her rebellious 15-year-old daughter, Josie.  Josie has announced her plan to lose her virginity on her upcoming 16th birthday to her loser of a boyfriend, Sean -- which Michelle desperately wants to prevent.  This results in a bet between mom & daughter: Josie agrees that, if Michelle meets and marries George Clooney by Christmas, she will not sleep with Sean and she will go to university. Hanging over Michelle's head is the ghost of her older and more successful sister, Jane, who died 16 years ago in a car accident -- and the unexpected appearance of Jane's fiancé, Rob, whose return to town creates more complications. The lingering impact of grief and its longterm effects on Michelle and her family was one of the things I liked most about this book.

Michelle's quest to meet and marry the desirable Mr. Clooney is more about a mother's love for her daughter and her desire to see her daughter live a better life -- to encourage her, by this outrageous example, to pursue her dreams -- than any huge celebrity obsession. (Also, other than the title and cover design, it really doesn't have a lot to do with Christmas.)  But it's fun to watch/read as (with the help of her loyal friends and coworkers) she confronts -- and overcomes -- one obstacle after another in pursuit of her goal.  Three stars.

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When I was in high school, I discovered the novels of D.E. Stevenson at my local library. Dorothy Emily Stevenson Peploe (1892-1973) was a cousin of Robert Louis Stevenson (Treasure Island, Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde, etc.), and wrote more than 40 novels of her own between 1923 and 1970. Seven million copies of her books were sold in both Britain and North America during those years. I adored her books, and when I was in university, I found a couple of dog-eared paperbacks by her in a used bookstore (including my personal favourite, "The Baker's Daughter").

Over the years, I have occasionally searched for more Stevenson's books -- sadly, without much success, as they have mostly gone out of print (and most of the used or older edition copies I've found online are horrendously priced).  They are perhaps a little old-fashioned, very much products of the time & place they were written -- but still, well-crafted and realistic stories -- funny, charming romances, comedies of manners and family dramas featuring engaging characters. As one recent cover blurb reads:  "There are no vampires, no faeries, no weird creatures, just a sweet story about real people living in a world I've always dreamed of."

"The Baker's Daughter," for example, is the story of Sue, an "old maid" who lives in small-town Scotland and keeps house for her widowed father, the village baker. Her father remarries and Sue, feeling like a third wheel, takes the bold step of leaving home and becoming the housekeeper for an eccentric artist and his wife who just moved to the area. When the bored wife returns to her glamorous life in the city, Sue stays on -- much to the shock of the scandalized villagers -- until (predictably) she realizes she has fallen in love with her employer.  It's a sweet little story that would likely never be written today -- and therein lies part of its charm, I think.

This past summer, dh & I were touring the home of the author Lucy Maud Montgomery in Leaskdale, Ontario (which I wrote about here), and noticed that several of the women in our tour group were wearing nametags with their names & locations. They came from all over North America -- Toronto, Tennessee, Missouri. "They must be part of an Internet group of some kind," dh guessed and, as we trooped upstairs to view the bedrooms, we asked them what group they were part of & how they had all met.

Turns out they WERE part of an Internet group (on Yahoo), and were in Toronto for their annual meetup. And -- in one of those weird, "small world" coincidences, they told me they were all fans of "a British author named D.E. Stevenson... you've probably never heard of her." 

I just about fell over. "You're kidding! I LOVE her stuff!"  I said, as dh rolled his eyes & shook his head in amazement.

They all just about fell over too -- what are the odds, right?? -- and invited me to join their group. :)  They told me that several Stevenson books have recently been reissued in new paperback editions, and since then, I have found five titles, in bookstores and online. The new covers have all been designed to show chic-ly dressed women in 1920s & 30s-era fashions (see one above). My theory is they're hoping to attract "Downton Abbey" fans as readers. ;) 

It's been quite a while since I last read a Stevenson novel, and I don't believe I had ever read "Miss Buncle's Book before. First published in 1934, it's about quiet, guileless, unassuming Miss Barbara Buncle, whose diminishing dividends (no doubt because it's the Depression) have forced her to look for ways to increase her income.

And so, Barbara writes a book -- a thinly disguised portrait of Silverstream, her hometown, and its residents (all using different names, but highly recognizable). To Barbara's surprise, an affable publisher agrees to publish her book (under the pseudonym "John Smith").  To her even greater surprise, it becomes a bestseller -- particularly in Silverstream, where the enraged residents immediately recognize themselves and set out to learn John Smith's true identity. Each chapter features a different Silverstream resident, his or her reaction to the book, and what happens to them after they've read it.

Among the new Stevenson editions in my to-read pile are two sequels:  "Miss Buncle Married" and "The Two Mrs. Abbotts."  I am looking forward to reading them soon! 

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I wish I had the funds to hand a copy of "WonderWomen: Sex, Power & the Quest for Perfection" by Debora L. Spar to every young woman I know, and to every naysayer who wonders whether feminism is still relevant or needed.

It's not that this book brings any hugely revolutionary ideas or insights to the table -- but it is a readable and well researched summary about how women's lives have evolved over the past 50 years, where we still have work to do and some possible solutions. My copy is full of dog-eared pages.

Spar is President of Barnard College (a prominent American women's college). She is roughly a year or two younger than I am, so her cultural references are mostly quite familiar to me -- e.g., the iconic ad for the 1970s perfume, Charlie (a huge bottle of which once adorned my dresser top). Her book is essentially a tour of the stages of her life -- and my life, and most women's lives of the past 50 years -- from childhood through establishing careers, marriages and families to aging -- and what lessons young women today can & should draw from our experiences. 

"Somehow -- without meaning to -- we became convinced... that having it all meant doing it all... And that being good meant being perfect," she says near the beginning of her book. (p. 50) The inflation of expectations, and the quest for perfection and control (versus the promise of liberation) is a running theme throughout the book (thus explaining the subtitle). 

Spar is the author of a previous book on reproductive technologies ("The Baby Business: How Money, Science, and Politics Drive the Commerce of Conception,"  which I have not read) who has experienced birth, pregnancy loss and adoption. She believes that pregnancy, birth and children remain central to most women's lives and are a core issue that make women's lives essentially different from men's -- and that we need to recognize and deal with this difference. As a result, the book includes some interesting discussions about the quest for conception, including ARTs, infertility and pregnancy loss, "pregnancy pornography" and the modern motherhood.

You may not agree with all of her prescriptions, but hers is a thoughtful and welcome voice in the ongoing conversation.  

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I have, as I have admitted in the past, a weakness for celebrity memoirs, particularly those rooted in Old Hollywood. "A Story Lately Told" by Anjelica Huston fits the bill perfectly.  The style is sometimes a bit disjointed, but there are some wonderful stories here, well told and full of familiar names.

Huston was born in Los Angeles but spent most of her growing up years in Ireland and in London (she was a teenager there during the Swinging Sixties). She was also a model in New York before moving back to LA in the early 1970s (which is the point where this book ends).  She is the daughter of legendary Hollywood director John Huston and granddaughter of actor Walter Huston -- the first three-generation Oscar-winning family in Academy Award history. Her mother, Enrica (Ricki) Soma, was a ballerina, and the fourth of John Huston's five wives. She died tragically in a car accident in 1969 when she was just 29 and her daughter was just 17. Huston writes movingly about her mother's death, how she and her siblings found out and dealt with the devastation. 

A second Huston memoir, "Watch Me," was released this fall, covering her Hollywood career, including her longtime romance with Jack Nicholson. I'm waiting for the paperback, but my understanding is she left Nicholson when she found out another woman was pregnant with his child. She eventually found love and marriage (but not children) with sculptor Robert Graham, who died in 2008.

I am not sure whether Huston is childless by choice or circumstance (or perhaps a bit of both), but hearing this story about her & Nicholson, I was reminded of Pattie Boyd's memoir (which I wrote about here), her struggles to conceive with both of her husbands (George Harrison & Eric Clapton) and how she left Clapton when another woman became pregnant with his child.

I'm looking forward to reading Huston's sequel (& possibly finding out more).

*** *** ***

These were books #17 through #21 that I read in 2014.

Since coming home, I've read one book (book #1 for 2015). 

I was happy to start the new year off with a new Flavia de Luce mystery by Alan Bradley (even happier that it was on the bookstore shelves several days before the scheduled release date, and even more so that I managed to get a discounted price on it). :)  Over the last few years, I've become very fond of Flavia -- a precocious 11-year-old would-be chemist (now about 12) -- and eagerly look forward to each new tale of her adventures, set in early 1950s post-war Britain. The last was published at this same time last year, which I blogged about here.

The 7th Flavia book, "As Chimney Sweepers Come to Dust" picks up where the last one left off, with Flavia en route across the Atlantic to attend her late mother's old boarding school in Canada. But all is not quite what it seems at Miss Bodycote's Female Academy: Flavia has barely arrived when a charred, mummified body wrapped in a flag tumbles out of the fireplace in her room. Whose body, how did it come to be there, who put it there, and why?  (And that's just for starters...)

I have to admit, while I adore Flavia, and the book was as well written and fun to read as usual, it ultimately left me feeling unsatisfied. I would rank most of the previous Flavia books 3.5 or 4 stars out of 4;  this one would probably rate a bit lower, perhaps a 3 to 3.5.  In part, I think this is because the story takes place away from England, the village of Bishop's Lacey, and the family estate of Buckshaw, including Flavia's family and the other familiar characters we've come to know in the previous books. Flavia is homesick for Buckshaw in this book and, frankly, so was I. There is a new cast of characters, and new adventures to be had, of course -- but perhaps a few too many new characters to keep straight sometimes, and few that measure up to the ones we've come to know and love in the previous books.

(Also somewhat unsatisfying (**SPOILER ALERT!!**) -- I was taken aback when Flavia was sent off to boarding school in Canada. I assumed (as did many others, I'm sure) that this was a major shift in the arc of the overall story, and that the next several books, at least, would be set there. Instead, at the very end of the book, Flavia is on her way back to her family in Merrie Olde England, leaving me wondering, "So what the heck was THAT all about??")

While the main mystery of the book is, of course, resolved in the end, the reader is still left with a lot of loose ends and unanswered questions. Presumably (hopefully), there will be future books where more of the ongoing mystery will be revealed and questions answered. 

This is one book where, to get the most out of your experience, I think you should probably read the previous books in the series first. 

Recent reading

Crosby, Stills, Nash (& sometimes Young) were part of the soundtrack of my growing-up years in the late 1960s and through the 1970s.  I still thrill to the sounds of their amazing harmonies on songs like "Suite Judy Blue Eyes" and "Teach Your Children." 

Back around the time I got married in the mid-1980s, David Crosby's drug use and multiple arrests were in the news, and I read his memoir "Long Time Gone" when it came out in paperback. So it was interesting to read a slightly different take on some of the same people and events in "Wild Tales" by Graham Nash.

Nash comes across as affable and balanced, and probably the most sane member of CSNY.  He unabashedly loves Crosby, tolerates the prickly but immensely talented Stephen Stills, and admits to a mutual love/hate relationship with the quirky Neil Young.  Nash admits to his own excesses of sex (Joni Mitchell and Rita Coolidge were his lovers before he met his second wife of 35+ years, Susan), drugs and rock 'n roll. Fortunately, he quit cocaine cold turkey in 1984, in part after seeing what it was doing to Crosby. 

Before Nash became part of CSNY, he was a member of The Hollies -- part of the British Invasion sound that formed another important part of the soundtrack of my life. (I loved their tight harmonies on songs like "Bus Stop" and "Carrie Anne," and a friend & I saw a Nash-less version of the group in concert in the late 1970s.)  I especially enjoyed the earlier part of the book where Nash describes his growing-up years in Manchester, his early encounters with the Beatles (competing in the same talent shows!) and the Everly Brothers, and his rise to fame with the Hollies, who included his best friend from his schooldays, Allan Clarke. 

I was also interested to learn that Nash is an accomplished photographer -- the cover photo is a selfie of him and his camera taken the old-fashioned way, in a mirror -- as well as a painter & sculptor and an entrepreneur.

If you are interested in CSNY or Sixties music, this would be a good choice.  It's not a difficult read.

***  *** ***

There's a well-known little piece of Canadian poetry that goes, "Toronto has no social classes/Only the Masseys and the masses."  The Masseys were among the wealthiest and most influential families in Canada in the late 1800s and early 1900s:  the patriarch, Daniel Massey of Newcastle, Ontario, invented the mechanical threshing machine and founded Massey Harris (later Massey Ferguson), which was at one time the world's largest manufacturer of agricultural machinery. One of Daniel's grandsons, Vincent Massey, became Canada's first Canadian-born governor general;  Vincent's brother, Raymond, became a famous actor.

In February 1915, another Massey grandson, Bert, was murdered -- shot on the steps of his Toronto home by his housemaid, Carrie Davies, who claimed he had tried to "ruin" her. It was a shocking event and irresistible fodder for the city's newspapers, particularly the Daily Star (which still exists today as the Toronto Star) and the Evening Telegram.

In "The Massey Murder," award-winning writer Charlotte Gray explores the murder and Carrie's sensational trial (which all happened within the same month!!), in the context of the times -- the changing face of Toronto's social order, the influx of immigrants, the growing movement for women's rights and their expanding role in the workplace, and the impact of the First World War.  Gray's previous books on Canadian history themes have tackled figures such as sister-writers Susanna Moodie and Catharine Parr Traill, inventor Alexander Graham Bell, poet Pauline Johnson, and events such as the Klondike gold rush.

The book was well written, well researched and interesting overall -- albeit just a bit flat. I got to the end and was left with the distinct feeling of "is that all?" Perhaps this is because we know so little about Carrie, the central figure in the drama -- she left no letters or diaries and her only words on record come from newspaper reports from the trial.

It would be an interesting read if you're into vintage true crime stories, upstairs/downstairs relationships, and/or social history (particularly related to Canada and, more specifically, Toronto). 

These were books #15 & #16 that I've read so far in 2014.

Recent reading

After reading "The Gift of Wings" by Mary Henley Rubio earlier this fall -- probably the definitive biography of L.M. Montgomery (which I reviewed here)  -- I dove into two other Montgomery-related books that had also been languishing in my gargantuan to-read pile.

The Selected Journals of L.M. Montgomery, Volume V: 1935-1942 as edited by Mary Rubio & Elizabeth Waterston, is the final volume of Montgomery's journals written before her death in April 1942, and the one volume that I hadn't read previously.

In some ways, I wish I had read this before tackling "The Gift of Wings," just to round things out  (also, that's the order in which the books were published).  On the other hand, Montgomery self-edited her journals, and barely wrote a thing during the last two years of her life. She is not always specific about what is happening, making sometimes cryptic references to certain people and events. In that respect, it was helpful to have read Rubio's book first, as she fills in some of the critical blanks and sheds new light on Montgomery's journal entries. (I did have to go back to "The Gift of Wings" at certain points while reading the journals to remind myself what the heck she meant.) 

As much as I love Montgomery, and as fascinating as it is to get a glimpse into her personal thoughts and feelings (however guarded), I have to admit, this is not a happy or cheerful book, and in some respects it was probably the hardest volume of the journals to get through. As it begins, Montgomery and her family had just moved from Norval, where her husband had lost his job as Presbyterian minister, to retire in Toronto. While Montgomery mourned the loss of her home in Norval, where she had led a mostly happy life, she begins on a hopeful note: her lovely new Tudor-style home in the suburb of Swansea was the first she had ever owned, and she was now closer to the intellectual and social circles of Toronto she desperately wanted to be part of.

But her husband's mental and physical health continued to deteriorate;  and she obsessed over her two sons -- their educations and love lives in particular. (Who said helicopter parenting is a 21st century phenomenon??)  Her oldest son, Chester, proved to be a huge disappointment to her, getting kicked out of engineering school, barely squeaking through law school, knocking up a girl from Norval, secretly marrying her -- and then running around with other women (and that's just for starters...!).  Her younger son, Stuart, was in many respects the "golden boy" of the family, but Montgomery frets over his studies as well, and especially over his ongoing friendship with a Norval girl she deems highly unsuitable.

It is difficult -- and, yes, sometimes a bit monotonous -- to follow as Montgomery tries desperately to keep up appearances and hold everything together, spirals into depression, ceases writing her journal all together -- and then dies at the far too young age of 67. The final entry is heartbreaking in its brevity and despair.  If you are a big Montgomery fan, though, and have read the other journals, you will need to read this to complete the full picture of this amazing author's life.

*** *** ***

About five years ago, Penguin Canada began publishing a series of 200-page books, written by notable Canadian authors, about "Extraordinary Canadians." Emily Carr, Lord Beaverbrook, Lester B. Pearson, Big Bear and Nellie McClung were among the first subjects, followed by Norman Bethune, Stephen Leacock, Mordecai Richler, Pierre Elliot Trudeau, Glenn Gould, Rene Levesque, Louis Hippolyte Lafontaine and Robert Baldwin,  Marshall McLuhan, Tommy Douglas, Louis Riel and Gabriel Dumont, Wilfrid Laurier and (yes) Lucy Maud Montgomery.

Extraordinary Canadians:  L.M. Montgomery was written by the novelist Jane Urquhart. While not as thorough or detailed a biography as Rubio's "The Gift of Wings," this is a great basic introduction to and appreciation of this beloved Canadian author, set in the context of her times. It also details her ongoing impact on Canada and on writers, both Canadian and generally -- including a lovely personal story about Urquhart's mother.

(These were books #13 & #14 that I've read to date in 2014.) 

*** *** ***

Some other recent reading of note:

• As I commented to a few childless-not-by-choicers online, when people ask me why we didn't "just adopt," I think I'm going to start handing them a copy of this Toronto Star column. The blog it refers to/links to is also interesting reading for anyone thinking of adopting through the public system in Ontario.
• A recent New York Times article noted the rising number of books & blogs designed to help parents "[navigate and transition] through the emotionally rocky waters of becoming an empty nester.”  (!)  The amusing part for me was seeing how many of the suggestions could just as easily serve as advice to couples navigating and transitioning through the emotionally rocky waters of accepting a childless life after infertility and loss -- such as transforming the child's bedroom (intended nursery) into a crafts room and finding a new community through social media.
•  Loved this piece from Huffington Post, "The Other Quiet Mom," which (appropriately) popped into my feed on Pregnancy & Infant Loss Awareness Day. So familiar, and it describes me to a T:   "Few ever realize how frequently and repetitively other mothers tell their "stories from the front" -- of pregnancy, labor and delivery, newborn gazing, breastfeeding -- unless they are one of the mothers who must master how to avoid tears just to be able to stay in the room...  stories that end with "and then they couldn't find the baby's heartbeat" generally stop a conversation. So these recollections tend to be kept inside, ratcheting up the aloneness that feels like it can smother a mother who has lost a child."  
• Much has been written over the past week about the move by Facebook & Apple to offer egg freezing to its female employees as part of their benefits. There was a lot of good reading on the subject to be had, but I wanted to point out one article that appeared in today's Globe & Mail.  While I have my doubts that today is the "golden age for working mothers" that careers columnist Leah Eichler describes, I was intrigued by her theory that "Infertility treatment might be the new maternity leave." (Caveat: this was written from a Canadian perspective, where -- compared to the United States -- most working women are guaranteed a fairly decent maternity leave.).  

While pushing egg freezing is rife with ethical complications, this move suggests that the physical act of bearing children will be more discussed at work. This change couldn’t come soon enough. While many companies laud their generous maternity benefits, we almost never discuss the no-man’s land before the baby, when many women yearn for that little miracle but their bodies have other intentions. Undergoing fertility treatment has none of the glamour of pregnancy, yet it can take up much more time and energy, not to mention have a huge impact on your wallet. Many of us, myself included, keep these painful episodes to ourselves but they can affect our professional lives in a major way. So it’s time to bring infertility out of the closet at work...  

Despite the prevalence of infertility, few companies or workplaces appreciate the impact it has on their employees, [author Reva] Seth said. 

“IVF and infertility are what maternity leave was two decades ago … and just like we needed to have discussions and best practices on pregnancy and maternity – we now need to do the same with IVF and infertility,” Ms. Seth said.

Thoughts?

"Lucy Maud Montgomery: The Gift of Wings" by Mary Henley Rubio

Following our recent visit to Leaskdale, I finally dusted off & started reading the biography of L.M. Montgomery that I had bought & wrote about waaayyyyyy back in (gulp) the fall of 2008.  

I've read books about Montgomery before, as well as all but the last volume of her published journals (and, as you might guess, all of her novels -- except I think "A Tangled Web" which I just couldn't get into... I was a preteen at the time, perhaps I should try again). So I knew the basics of the story of her life.  

But there was still so much that I didn't know -- that so many people didn't know -- before reading this book. 

The journals, of course, are an important source for this definitive biography of one of Canada's best-known and best-loved authors -- and Rubio was one of the editors who worked, over a period of some 20 years, to bring them to publication. But as she points out in this book, the journals only show us one side of Maud (as she was known) -- and they were carefully written (and possibly rewritten) with a later audience firmly in mind.  There is always more than one side to any story, and Rubio does an excellent job of delving into the many facets of this very complex woman, her life and times, and the people around her.  

Before he died in 1982, Montgomery's youngest son, Dr. Stuart Macdonald, tasked Rubio with editing his mother's journals for publication. Besides Macdonald, Rubio spoke with many others who knew Montgomery and her family, including relatives, friends, neighbours, members of the parishes where Montgomery's husband, Ewan Macdonald, preached, and several of the family's maids. She sheds new light on a number of important people and events in Maud's life, including Ewan Macdonald and his mental illness, her relationship with her sons, her youthful passion for handsome young farmer Herman Leard, and her midlife friendship/rumoured extramarital romance with another minister from PEI, Edwin Smith.  She also writes about each of Montgomery's novels and how the characters and themes reflect what was happening in the author's life at the time the books were being written.

For all the joy that she brought (and continues to bring) to millions of readers, Montgomery's life was not a particularly happy one. Her mother died when she was very young;  her father left her in the care of her strict grandparents and headed west, where he remarried.  Like her heroines Anne & Emily, young Maud knew the sting of not being wanted or valued, particularly because she was a girl, and a longing for home and family is a theme that runs through most of her novels. 

She finally got a home and family of her own when she married Macdonald -- but she struggled to deal with his mental illness, her wayward older son, her unscrupulous American publisher, an overly zealous female fan, and a male-dominated Canadian literary community and critics who dismissed her work in the modernist years after the war (even as she worked tirelessly with the Canadian Authors Association to promote Canadian books, authors & themes) -- among other issues. (And, as previously noted, she knew the tragedy of stillbirth with the loss of her second son, Hugh, in 1914.) 

The constant struggle to keep up appearances in the face of these mounting problems took their toll (although she did an excellent job -- when her journals began being published in the 1980s, many who had known Montgomery as a cheerful, jovial minister's wife were shocked by some of the revelations -- about her husband's mental health and her own inner turmoil --  as well as her sometimes nasty opinions about family members, friends & neighbours). Throughout her life and especially toward the end, both Montgomery and her husband took copious amounts of barbituates and other prescription drugs (as did many people at the time) to help them cope with their various ailments, not realizing their addictive properties and damaging side effects. Montgomery was found dead in her bed in April 1942 with several bottles of pills on her night table, along with what may very well have been a suicide note. The story wraps up with an epilogue in which we find out what happened to Ewan, Chester, Stuart, and some of the other characters mentioned throughout the story.

The title, "The Gift of Wings," refers to a 1920 passage from her journals, which Rubio feels serves as a good epitaph for Maud's life:

"One cannot have imagination and the gift of wings, along with the placidity and contentment of those who creep on the earth's solid surface and never open their eyes on aught but material things. But the gift of wings is better than placidity and contentment after all."

This was not a particularly happy book to read, and it still leaves us with a number of questions (many of which may never be answered fully).  But it is extremely well researched and written, and a "must" for any Montgomery fan who wants to learn more about the author. (And hefty -- 700+ pages!!)  Montgomery and her novels have been touchstones in my life ever since I read "Anne of Green Gables" at age 8, and reading this book made me realize all over again the profound impact they have had on me.

This is book #12 that I've read so far this year.

"Mastering the Art of Quitting" by Peg Streep & Alan Bernstein

"Quitting" is a word I have long avoided when talking about my infertility journey. I stopped fertility treatments, I ended them, I left them, I made the decision to stop/end/leave treatment and live without children, I chose to take my life in a different direction. 

Why quibble over "quit"? It's not hard to understand why:  in our achievement & success-oriented culture, quitting has a negative connotation. Nobody wants to be thought of as a quitter -- and certainly not in the infertility & loss community, where people don't seem to want to hear any story except one with a conventionally happy ending (i.e., a living, healthy baby, no matter what the costs or what you had to do to get him/her).

Well, fellow travellers on this less-travelled road, it's time to embrace "the Q word"  ;) (as my sister calls it -- only in her case, she's talking -- or rather, avoiding talking -- about quitting smoking, lol)(as the book says, "the only kind of giving up we collectively accept and support"). And there's a new book to help us do that.

"Mastering the Art of Quitting:  Why it Matters in Life, Love and Work" doesn't mention infertility at all -- but I saw myself and other infertile women I know throughout its pages. I believe its message totally applies to those of us who are at a crossroads in our journey and trying to decide if we should continue treatment or follow another path (and if so, which one).

The book is slightly academic in tone with lots of psychological terminology and studies quoted (I'll admit this did bog me down a bit in spots).  And yet there was something on just about every page that I could relate to or that gave me food for thought. My copy is full of dog-eared pages.

"Quitting not only frees us from the hopeless pursuit of the unattainable but permits us to commit to new and more satisfying goals."  This, in a nutshell, is the message of this book. (You can probably understand why I found it so appealing...!)

So why does quitting have such a bad rap?  "We've all been taught that quitting is a sign of weakness and that quitting is for losers,"  the authors bluntly note. (p. 3)  Persistence and positive thinking, we are told from the time we are children, are the keys to success. Moreover, the authors demonstrate that human beings are hard wired to persist in pursuit of a goal -- even when the goal is unreachable or no longer satisfying.

The book not only promotes quitting as a valid option, it discusses why and how we should quit when something is not working for us. (The trick is to disengage from old goals while setting new ones.)  It includes helpful quizzes and tips to help us make better decisions and to set and pursue new goals in a more realistic way. 

If you are struggling with decisions about whether to stay on your current path or take a completely different direction in your life, this book would be an excellent resource. 

This was book #11 that I've read so far this year.

Summer reading

Besides finishing off the previously reviewed "A Man Called Destruction,"  I finished off three other books while on my recent vacation. Here are some thoughts on each of them: 

While enduring yet another bout of perimenopausal symptoms recently, I spotted "The Madwoman in the Volvo:  My Year of Raging Hormones" by Sandra Tsing Loh at the local bookstore, and immediately snapped it up.  

By the time Loh was 49, her life was a mess: she was juggling two pre-teenaged daughters, an aging (and eccentric) father, a career, and a  messy divorce, following an affair with her business partner. A perpetual cloud of gloom and irritability seemed to hang over her.  She was gaining weight.  After breaking down over the death of her daughters' pet hamster, a friend pinpointed the root of her problems: menopause.  The book follows Loh over the next two years to her milestone 50th birthday party, and mixes her personal story with humour and with some great nuggets of information about women, aging and menopause. 

I am not menopausal (yet -- although I am definitely getting there). I'm not a mom (and I did roll my eyes at Loh's portrayal of her friend Judith:  "Oh, the lightness of step of the child-free!" -- seriously??), and while my parents are starting to slow down, they are nowhere near 90 yet, let alone in need of the kind of help Loh's father required. I don't even have a job to worry about anymore (who would have thought that retirement would come before menopause??)(and I'm actually kind of grateful that when Aunt Flo is paying me a particularly nasty visit, I can now just pop some ibuprofen and take refuge on my couch, instead of slogging my way through the workday).

But there was still a lot here that I could relate to -- and I suspect many of you can, too (or will).  Consider this: by 2015 -- next year -- half of all American women will be menopausal. HALF!!  Moreover, Loh points out, we are menopausal women like no others in history. Long ago, many women died before they ever reached menopause. These days, we may live longer, but we're also taking longer to reach certain life milestones. While our mothers and grandmothers had their children in their 20s and sent us off to college when they were in their 40s, many of us delayed having children until our 30s & 40s.  These days, menopause often coincides with our children's adolescence -- and our parents' aging -- at the same time we are juggling the most demanding years of our working life.  Sandwich squeeze, anyone?

I was especially intrigued by Loh's point that, with menopause, we are returning to our pre-teen, pre-fertility years. Our fertile years are actually the aberration, not menopause... and "crazy menopausal women" are actually reclaiming a part of themselves they had long put on hold.

"If, in an eighty-year lifespan, a female is fertile for about twenty-five years (let's call it ages fifteen to forty), it is not menopause that triggers the mind-altering and hormone-altering variation;  the hormonal "disturbance" is actually fertility.  Fertility is the change. It is during fertility that a female loses herself, and enters that cloud overly rich in estrogen. Due to lifespans being as long as they are, thirty years of addled fertility in the middle isn't the "norm" for a woman, that almost sixty years of the relative selfishness of prepubescence and menopause are." (p. 237) 

The book ends with Loh's tips on how to survive menopause. (She is a big fan of Dr. Christiane Northrup & her book "The Wisdom of Menopause.")  I can't say I related to everything in this book, but it did give me a few laughs and insights, and you may enjoy it too. 

*** *** ***

WAs someone who is forever making to-do lists (often on post-it notes) and loves my yellow highlighter, I was drawn to the cover of "Overwhelmed: Work, Love and Play When No One Has the Time" by Brigid Schulte.  When I started reading the reviews, I knew this was a book I had to read. And I am very glad I did. It is a must-read for anyone who is feeling time challenged and overwhelmed by modern life -- and I suspect that's most of us, at least in North America.  

Yes, I know -- I don't have kids;  supposedly I have oodles of free time, right? I suppose some people (parents) think I have no right to feel overwhelmed (how dare I??). And while I recognize that I DO have more free time than the average parent (and certainly now that I am unemployed/retired), there have been many times when I too felt "overwhelmed" by all the demands on my time and attention, and by a to-do list that never seems to get any shorter. 

"I think of confetti," writes Schulte, a journalist with the Washington Post. "That's how my life feels. Like time confetti -- one big, chaotic burst of exploding slivers, bits, and scraps. And really, what does a pile of confetti ever amount to?"

Schulte was late for her meeting with a time management expert -- who confounded her by claiming that women had an average of 30 hours of leisure a week (!). (Personally, I thought his definitions of "leisure" were really stretching it at times:  exercise is leisure?? Waiting for a tow truck is leisure?) 

But if we really have 30 hours of leisure time a week, why do we all feel so tired and stressed?? Schulte set out to find out, and the result is this well-researched and well-written book.

I particularly loved the section of the book set in Fargo, North Dakota -- an area of the country near & dear to my heart -- where Schulte found people are just as time-stressed as anywhere else. A UND researcher shared her collection and analysis of holiday family letters (of all things), which demonstrate a dramatic rise in busyness in American families in recent years -- or at least the appearance of busyness.

Because while there are any number of valid factors we can point to as to why we are so time-starved these days (and Schulte investigates all of them -- the rise of working mothers, the cult of intensive motherhood, the lack of supportive government and workplace policies...), the truth is that, in part, it is our own darned fault. We don't manage our time as well as we might, or set boundaries as well as we should. And even if we aren't that busy, we dare not admit it. "Busyness is now the social norm that people feel they must conform to... or risk being outcasts," Schulte writes. When everyone around us keeps saying they are "busy, busy, busy," do you want to be the one person to say you're not?  

Schulte looks for "bright spots" where it's easier to balance work, love and play, and travels to Denmark for an eye-opening contrast in cultures. She details her own efforts to take back her life and find time to truly play.  And she winds up with a list of suggestions on how we can do the same. 

Highly recommended. :)

*** *** ***

Confession:  I have never read the blogger known as "The Blogess."  But I heard enough about her through the blogging grapevine to recognize the name(s) on the cover of "Let's Pretend This Never Happened."

The Bloggess's real name is Jenny Lawson, and "Let's Pretend" is a memoir following her from her bizarre childhood in Texas to present day.

Frankly, I found the first few chapters, full of dead animals and live ones, to be slightly offputting.  Caveat emptor if you have any phobias about snakes, scorpions, stuffed dead squirrels, chupacabras (?? -- you learn something new every day...).  I was seriously considering throwing in the towel & moving on to something else.

But I soon found myself chuckling in spite of myself. And also sniffling.  Jenny is "one of us" -- she too survived infertility and pregnancy loss before finally surprising herself by giving birth to her daughter Hayley. She writes warmly about the blogging world and about the bonds she's formed with other bloggers. She also writes frankly (and humorously) about her struggles with mental illness, including anxiety.

This is a book that's probably best consumed in small doses -- I found myself exhausted at times from the frantic style. On balance, it was an enjoyable read. But as I said, caveat emptor... ;) 

*** *** ***

These were books numbers 8. 9 and 10 that I've read so far in 2014. (I'm currently bouncing back & forth between 11 & 12.)  ;) 

Big Star still shines brightly

If it's spring/summer, I must be in the throes of a new musical obsession, lol. (Cases in point: Raspberries, 2012;  the Rascals, 2013.) 

The difference this time around being that while I listened to both the Raspberries & the Rascals in my 1960s/70s youth, and then rediscovered them in middle age, I don't think I had ever heard of Big Star until I started watching "That 70s Show" -- in the late 1990s, lol -- and wondering where the kick-ass theme song, "In the Street" (also known as "That 70s Song") came from.

(After writing that, I Googled the show to refresh my memory exactly when "That 70s Show" began. Interestingly, the first episode aired August 23, 1998 -- about two weeks after Katie's stillbirth. I always got a kick out of the show & the memories it evoked of my own mid/late 1970s teenaged years -- Eric, Donna, Kelso, Jackie, Hyde & Fez would have been exactly my age -- and every character reminded me of someone I really had known in high school, lol -- but beyond the nostalgia factor, the show no doubt provided a welcome distraction at a time when I really, really needed one.)  

Anyway, I noticed the name "Alex Chilton" as the song's author in the credits & that sounded vaguely familiar. (The theme was originally sung by someone named Todd Griffin, but in later seasons by Cheap Trick, which definitely IS a band I remember well from my teenaged years. I found this fun video of them doing the theme song on YouTube.... for comparison, here is Big Star's original version... and a clip of a later incarnation of Big Star, featuring Chilton and original drummer Jody Stephens, doing the song on the Leno show in 1994 -- a couple of years before "That 70s Show" began.) 

When I rediscovered the Raspberries a few years back & started exploring links online, the name Big Star kept coming up -- both bands cited as prime examples of the "power pop" genre at its finest. So I started Googling Big Star and listened to some clips of their songs via YouTube. 

If you've never heard of Big Star or Alex Chilton, you're not alone (and welcome to the cult, lol).  Obscure as they may be, Big Star has a bigger following today than they did when they first recorded and toured in the 1970s.  It seems that most people who hear their music love it (then & now) -- but for a variety of reasons (including record company distribution problems beyond their control), they just never found an audience -- at least, not at the time their records were originally released.  Maybe they jinxed themselves -- after all, they had the audacity to call themselves "Big Star" (although they did lift the name & logo from a local supermarket chain) and their first album "#1 Record."

Before Big Star, Alex Chilton had been a member of the Box Tops, whose song "The Letter" -- recorded when he was just 16 -- was one of the biggest hits of 1967.  ("The Letter" is one of those songs I clearly remember from my childhood. In fact, I can remember being at my grandmother's & watching "American Bandstand" the day Dick Clark revealed at the #1 song of the week.) Saleswise, the Box Tops proved to be the apex of Chilton's career. After Big Star's first three albums flopped, he spent some time in New York, dabbling in the punk and indie music scenes (he was a regular at CBGB in its heyday), playing cover tunes in hotel bars and at one point washing dishes for a living in New Orleans, where he eventually settled. He was always more influential than commercially successful, but eventually did earn a comfortable living from royalties (including from "That 70s Show") and reunion tours with Big Star and the Box Tops.

Over the years, Big Star's music continued to find new audiences and be re-recorded by other bands and musicians. The Bangles, for example (another band I love(d)), recorded the Big Star song "September Gurls" in the 1980s.  I've read that when the Bangles met Chilton & learned he had never received a penny in royalties from their version, they promptly wrote him a cheque in gratitude. 

Chilton died of a heart attack in 2010 at the far too young age of 59, just before a reconstituted version of Big Star was supposed to play at the SXSW conference in Austin, Texas.  (Apparently he had been feeling ill for some time but had not sought treatment, in part because he lacked health insurance.) Not long afterward, original bass player Andy Hummel also passed away (from cancer), and I remember reading both obituaries in the newspapers at the time.

Then last year, a documentary about Big Star, "Nothing Can Hurt Me," was released to critical acclaim. (I have yet to see it, but the promo clips on You Tube are intriguing.) 

More recently, my interest in Big Star and Chilton was piqued anew when I found a new book, "A Man Called Destruction: The Life and Music of Alex Chilton" by Holly George-Warren. There was also a book, "Big Star: The Story of Rock's Forgotten Band" by Rob Jovanovic, already in the music section -- recently updated to capitalize on the documentary -- and so I picked up both books and then read them, one after the other (with YouTube music clips as soundtracks).

There's aren't many books out there on the band -- so if you are into Big Star &/or Chilton big time, or want to learn more about them, both would be essential reading.  Both are well researched.  If you are more interested in the band as a whole, "Big Star" by Jovanovic is a good primer -- although I must confess I found the writing slightly flat. I did enjoy learning more in its pages about group founder Chris Bell, who tragically joined the "27 Club" in 1978 when he crashed his car into a lamppost, and whose huge contribution to the group has been overshadowed by Chilton's.  (Drummer Jody Stephens is the lone remaining member of the original lineup.)

"A Man Called Destruction" is primarily focused on Alex Chilton, and I personally found it to be the better written and more engaging of the two books. Chilton was a fascinating character -- gifted and talented, but also (like many geniuses, I suppose) conflicted and troubled -- an abuser of both drugs and alcohol (as well as, sometimes, women -- although he did eventually find marital happiness later in life) -- prone to undermining his own success,  and sometimes, yes, a bit of a jerk. 

While he & Big Star may both be gone, their legacy continues to grow as new generations (and those of us who missed out the first time around) continue to (re)discover their music. 

These were books numbers 6 & 7 that I've read so far this year (finished while I was on vacation).

"The Beatles: All These Years: Tune In" by Mark Lewisohn

I love them, yeah, yeah, yeah. ;) 

If you're a longtime reader of my blog, you'll know that I have had an almost lifelong love affair with the Beatles. (I recently did a search of my blog & tagged all the Beatles-related posts I could find with their own "The Beatles" label.) I can't remember a time when they weren't part of my life.

I had just turned 3 when they made their famous North American debut appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show in February 1964;  I think I had just turned 5 when my mother took me to see them in the movie "Help!" in the spring of 1966, thereby setting me up for a lifetime of dreaming about Ringo's ring stuck on my finger and falling through trapdoors into cellars where tigers prowled. I was 9 when they broke up, a teenager as they established their solo careers (my sister & I owned several Wings albums between us), and a university student when John Lennon was murdered outside his Manhattan apartment building.

I've read a number of books about the Fab Four, collectively and individually, including Hunter Davies' 1968 authorized biography, The Beatles;  Shout! by Philip Norman;  and "The Beatles" by Bob Spitz (reviewed here). I am sure there are many Beatles fans who are far more knowledgeable than I -- but at the same time, I think I'm pretty well informed about the group and its history, probably more so than the average Joe or Jane on the street.

You would think there wouldn't be a whole lot more to discover about them that hasn't already been reported. And you might think that, knowing the Beatles story as well as I do, I would find yet another Beatles book a case of "been there, read that."

You would be wrong, on both counts.

"Does the world really need another book on the Beatles?"  their longtime road manager & Apple executive Neil Aspinall asked author Mark Lewisohn, when he was approached about this project. 

Well, yes -- apparently it does. "There's nothing like the Beatles story to legitimately go everywhere and strongly connect everything to everyone,"  Lewisohn says in the book's introduction, explaining why he decided to write the book, and to do so in the way that he has. "It's a blockbuster history with surprises at every turn, many heroes and a few villains, unparalleled triumphs, great joys and genuine tragedies, the ebbs and flows of human lives -- plus an avalanche of fortuitous chances and coincidences that defy probability. From the project's conception, I've seen it as the Beatles in their times -- them in their world and the world right about them."

And the book lives up to Lewisohn's vision for it. Familiar as I was with the contours of the Beatles' story, there was so, so much that I didn't know, or that was presented in a fresh new light, or with new information that questioned or challenged the veracity of old stories. Lewisohn does place the Beatles in the context of their times -- what it was like to grow up in Liverpool in the post-war years, how the British entertainment industry worked, just how unique the Beatles were as a group that was both a vocal group AND an instrumental group. The book is amazingly well researched, drawing on sources new & old, from Aspinall, who ended years of silence by speaking to Lewisohn shortly before his death, to the girls who used to frequent their legendary lunchtime shows at the Cavern Club.  There is much here that's familiar, but also much that's new. So yes, apparently we did need another book about the Beatles. :) 

I loved how Lewisohn pointed out interesting links and coincidences and near-misses of history throughout the book -- that "avalanche of fortuitous chances and coincidences that defy probability." A few examples: 

• A 1962 photo session to publicize "Love Me Do" took place near the docks of Liverpool -- on the very spot where John Lennon's ancestors had lived when they arrived in Liverpool from Ireland, fleeing the potato famine. 
• Producer George Martin took oboe lessons from the mother of Jane Asher, who later became Paul's girlfriend.
• Paul and John's first meeting has long been pegged at a church fete on July 6, 1957 (28 years to the day before my wedding) -- but Lewisohn hints they may have actually met several months earlier, at a newsstand called -- of all things -- Abba (!).
• And August 17, 1960, the first night the Beatles played in Hamburg, was 20 years to the day from the first Nazi air raids on Liverpool.  “Rock and roll music was taken to Hamburg by the children of the survivors, to be heard in turn by children who’d outlived the Allies’ revenge blitz of 1943,” Lewisohn writes.  

Overall, I think my familiarity with the Beatles story was a plus in reading this book. It took me several months to plow through this book -- but because I was familiar with the overall arc of the story and the main characters, I could pick it up and put it down, dip in & out, without losing the thread of the story. Obviously, I was predisposed to like it, and so it's hard for me to judge how someone new to the Beatles story might receive it. I imagine it could be a tad overwhelming -- but my bet is that you will find it highly entertaining as well as informative.  

This is actually just the first volume in a planned three-volume set, taking us from the Beatles' family origins in Liverpool, up to the end of 1962 -- with "Love Me Do" still hanging in on the charts, "Please Please Me" waiting in the wings for release in the new year, and the group poised on the verge of something very big. And get this -- what I read -- all 803 pages (plus notes) -- is an ABRIDGED version of the book. There is a longer, deluxe "author's cut" edition, running to 1,700+ pages (!!), but available only (for now, at least) in England.  I bought the hardcover when it first came out last fall/winter, but soon realized it was far too heavy to be lugging back & forth on the commuter train in my briefcase every day. So I got an e-version for my Kobo -- much lighter -- and consulted the notes for each chapter in the hardcover version as I read along.  

As I got closer to the end of the book, I found myself torn -- should I keep plowing on through to the close -- or linger on each page and savour it, before there were no more pages to read?? Sadly, Volume 2 is still being written. While Volume 1 took 10 years to research and write, Lewisohn doesn't think Volume 2 will take quite so long to put together. I've heard estimated delivery dates ranging anywhere from 2016 to 2020. (!!) (Presumably if Volume One was "Tune In," Volume Two will be "Turn On" and Volume Three, "Drop Out"??)

I can hardly wait. :) 

This was book #5 that I've read so far this year. (Although I'm thinking that, at 800+ pages, maybe it should count as two or three books, lol.) 

"All Joy and No Fun" by Jennifer Senior

Although I am not a parent (in the active sense, anyway), I am fascinated by parenting issues, and by how different childhood & parenting seem today from what I remember of my own experiences growing up. Today's style of intensive, "helicopter" parenting sometimes makes me wonder whether I could have cut it as a mom. (And sometimes makes me very glad that I don't have kids, if this is what it takes these days to pass as an acceptable parent.)

I've always found it interesting how parents could be screaming at their children & complaining about them in one breath, and then in the next ask when *I* was going to have kids and tell me how wonderful they were.  Gee, you're a walking advertisement. ;) 

This paradox is reflected in the title and explored in the pages of Jennifer Senior's new book, "All Joy and No Fun: The Paradox of Modern Parenthood."  This is not so much a how-to manual or advice guide as a study of the challenges of modern parenthood, how those challenges are different from what parents of the past faced, and the impact of parenting on parents themselves. There is a nice balance of academic research (presented in a highly accessible way) and chats with/observations of real-life parents and kids.

Senior sets out and explores three reasons why modern parenting has become such a complicated affair: 

• First, for the first time in history, parenthood is a choice -- when and whether to have children at all and, if so, how many. In the past, children were viewed as an economic necessity (to help with the family farm or business) or moral obligation;  today, children are seen as crowning achievements and sources of parental fulfillment. “Mothering and fathering aren’t just things we do," Senior observes. "Being a mother or being a father is who we are.”
• Second, governments and businesses have yet to adjust to the influx of mothers into the workplace. Fathers, too are trying to figure out their new roles. 
• Finally, childhood itself has been completely redefined in the years since the Second World War. As Senior observes, "Children went from being our employees to our bosses."  

Most of the book deals with the challenges of modern parenting. It isn't until the final chapter that Senior looks at the joy part of her equation.  She delves into the concepts of "the experiencing self" versus "the remembering self" -- which explains to some extent why, as I mentioned earlier, a parent can be screaming at their child in one breath and then a short time later rhapsodizing about the wonders of parenthood and encouraging you to join the club. Senior does acknowledge (albeit briefly) that children are not the only things that can invest a life with joy, meaning and purpose, which I appreciated as a childless-not-by-first-choice woman.

If you're a parent, you will likely find this book a source of validation and insight into your role. On the flip side, one review I read said that if you're on the fence about becoming a parent & read this book, you'll probably run away screaming. ;) (Or words to that effect.) I'm not sure about that -- we all know that parenting is hard. This book may not give you any firm answers as to whether you should take the plunge... but it sure raises some interesting questions. I enjoyed it! 

This is book #4 that I have read in 2014.

"Otherhood" by Melanie Notkin

Melanie Notkin, founder of Savvy Auntie, has a marketer's knack for identifying and catering to a neglected market segment -- in this case, the growing number of women who don't currently and may never have children -- and coining catchy new terms to describe them/us -- including "PANK (Professional Aunt, No Kids)" and "circumstantial infertility."

Now Notkin has coined another catchy new term for those of us who are not moms. If you're a PANK, and not experiencing motherhood, you're part of the "Otherhood."

"Otherhood" is also the name of Notkin's new book. In her own words:

"We have gone without definition or visibility for too long. I am offering "Otherhood" as a name for our misunderstood group of women doing our best to live full and meaningful lives despite the frustrations of some of our most cherished longings. We, the Otherhood, who have yet to find our rightful, equitable, requisite place in society, deserve one....  

"Otherhood uncovers, explores, and examines this overlooked and misunderstood segment of contemporary women. Part anecdotal storytelling, part inspiration, part reportage and part manifesto, Otherhood sets out to get to the heart of the issues, enliven the societal consciousness, and trigger conversation in and around our tribe."

(Ironically, I found this book in the bookstore on a shelf along with "The Mom Shift" by Reva Seth and "French Parents Don't Give In" by Pamela Druckerman. ;)  )

I really wanted to like this book. I was predisposed to like it. After all, I'm part of the Otherhood.  It's a subject near & dear to my heart. And overall, it's a good book that makes some important points.

But I have a few reservations.

First: Notkin uses composite characters throughout her book -- "women and men whose identifying characteristics have been modified or blended with others to protect their privacy" (with the exception of the experts quoted). Some experiences and events have also been modified, compressed or out of chronological order. Notkin is, at least, upfront about her use of this literary device -- there's a note about it at the very start of the book. Even so, perhaps it's the journalist in me, but this does tend to make me a little uneasy.

Second, while Notkin's description of the Otherhood is inclusive of all childless women, and the book's introduction talks about the rise of childless women generally, the book is primarily directed to Notkin's own particular segment of the Otherhood -- women like herself, who are not just childless but childless because they are single and looking for love and marriage before motherhood (even if that means they never become a mother at all). If you're single, childless and hoping to be a mother, this is definitely the book for you. If you're married, some of the content might not be quite as compelling. 

That said, the final third or so of the book does move beyond the problem of finding a man to procreate with and delve into other reasons why women might find themselves childless as they enter their 40s. 

Third, the book isn't just heavily focused on single women, but on a very particular subset of them. As Publishers Weekly noted in its otherwise positive review: "the affluent Manhattan-centricity of the author's cohort may alienate less-privileged readers."  Even though Notkin laments that "'Sex and the City' remains the dominant pop cultural portrait of our supposed lifestyle," many chapters of the book read like... episodes of "Sex and the City," revolving around Melanie and her 40-something single friends -- who invariably have fabulously glamorous-sounding careers (there's Wynn, a fashion PR executive;  Rachel, a beauty industry executive; Stephanie, founder and CEO of an advertising agency;  Meredith, an Ivy League-educated attorney... you get the idea...) -- meeting at a lengthy list of chic Manhattan bars and restaurants (the book could also double as a NYC bar & restaurant guide) to sip cocktails, eat brunch, and talk about the men they've met and why they won't take responsibility for planning a single date, nevermind committing to a serious relationship.

I suppose she is just following that old piece of writerly advice, "Write about what you know" -- but the Otherhood isn't just a neighbourhood in Manhattan. It might have been nice if she had gone slightly outside of her comfort zone and made an effort to talk to childless women elsewhere in the U.S. (and in the world, for that matter) -- maybe in some smaller cities or even rural communities, where the pool of eligible men is a lot smaller. Maybe a few more secretaries, teachers, human resources managers, accountants, retail clerks...

With these caveats aside -- the book is worth a read. While some of the content is narrow in focus, it covers the issues facing single women who want to be mothers quite thoroughly. The introduction sets the stage well, outlining the reasons why so many 40-something women today find themselves without the children they wanted, and the final few chapters move beyond discussions of finding a partner to other issues such as infertility, egg freezing, single motherhood and dealing with partners who are reluctant to have children, or more children (as is often the case with men on their second or third marriages). 

With women like me, Notkin is obviously preaching to the choir. Hopefully her message will reach outside the Otherhood and provide some food for thought.

If you read "Otherhood," I'd be curious to hear what you thought of it!

This is book #3 that I have read in 2014 to date.

"The Dead in Their Vaulted Arches" by Alan Bradley

If you're a longtime reader of my blog, you might remember that I'm a big fan of Alan Bradley's Flavia de Luce mystery series. The previous (fifth) book in the series ended with a bit of a cliffhanger... so I was eagerly awaiting the latest/sixth installment in the series, The Dead in Their Vaulted Arches. 

It was also due to be released on Jan. 14th, right around my birthday. In fact, I was in our local mega-bookstore the day before my birthday & looked it up on the store computer. The computer said there were (already) 16 copies in stock. I scoured the store thoroughly, looking on the display tables, in the new release section at the front of the store, the fiction and mystery sections, but there were none to be found. I decided to nab one of the clerks and ask about it. I figured there must be some copies lurking in the back storage room, and I was willing to play the birthday card, if necessary. ; )

Now, every OTHER time I have visited that store, I haven't been able to walk two feet without someone asking if they could help me find something. I wandered up & down the aisles and stood on the steps to an elevated section for a good 20 minutes, looking for someone to help me in my elusive quest. Not a single clerk to be found anywhere, except for two behind the counter, ringing in sales for a long lineup of customers. Figures. :p I had to wait to get my copy on Jan. 14th, like everyone else. :(

Anyway.

It was worth the wait. :)

The book opens as the de Luce family -- and the entire village, as well as some special guests (Winston Churchill??!) -- await the train bearing the casket containing the body of Flavia's mother, Harriet, who went missing years earlier in the Himalayas under still-mysterious circumstances. A stranger whispers a cryptic message into Flavia's ear -- and then, moments later, lies dead on the tracks, pushed under the train by someone in the crowd.  Who killed him and why? And what connection might there be to Harriet's disappearance and death?

The book unfolds over the next few days leading up to the funeral, with Flavia, her father, sisters and others mourning Harriet and dealing with her loss in their own individual ways. This being 1951 Britain, they mostly do so with stiff upper lips firmly in place. Nevertheless, Flavia has some sharp observations to offer on the nature of grief, bereavement, loss and mourning that resonated only too well with me, and likely with others who have also experienced the loss of a loved one. 

If this book sounds interesting to you -- I would strongly recommend that you start with the first book in the series, The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie, and read all the books in order. You would probably still enjoy this book as a standalone, but it does build on & refer to characters and events from the past books, and I think you would appreciate it much more if you had ... in context.

I don't seem to have reviewed the initial book in the series, The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie, on my blog, but here's where I've written about the others:

The Weed That Strings the Hangman's Bag
A Red Herring Without Mustard
I Am Half-Sick of Shadows
Speaking From Among the Bones

This was book #2 that I have read in 2014 to date.