A re-read of a biography of Carole King, Joni Mitchell and Carly Simon. This is a heavily researched book, sometimes with too many asides in parenthesis plus footnotes. But the saving grace is this completeness, commentary on the specific social context; the contrasting lives of these three very different artists are presented brilliantly along with the social history of the times. The best and most detailed part of the book is their ascent to fame in the 1960s. Their personal stories with complicated relationships are presented with insightful commentary. A great read for anyone nostalgic for the ’60s or for anyone who is curious about these revolutionary times (a comments from someone who CAN remember the ‘60s).
Category: Location / Setting
Cat’s Eye – Margaret Atwood
Elaine, a middle-aged painter who lives in Vancouver, returns to Toronto (where she grew up) for a retrospective show of her paintings. This causes her to reminisce about her life. The entire book is great but for me, the first 1/3 is perfect. Atwood wonderfully captures the relationships between 8- to 10-year-olds, alternating between friendships and toxic competitions. School with corporal punishments and skipping grades, shopping and shoplifting things at Woolworths. And how children acquire (mis)information in an era when parental communication was non-existent. Another gem.
Little Women – Louisa M. Alcott
Everyone seems to e familiar with the March sisters from multiple movies and TV series, but I had never read the original novel published in 1909. Part 1 was read from an old book inscribed as being the “Property of Maisie Bentley 1913”, purchased in Bristol I think. Part of the charm in reading this very old book was inclusion of 8 full-page colour illustrations. Part 2 was read as a library e-book. Alcott’s writing is necessarily old-fashioned with emphasis on morals and some authorial homilies. These characters are so indelible and well-loved that it was a treat to read the original words.
Dominicana – Angie Cruz
It is the 1960s: Ana is 15 years old and newly married when she moves to New York City with her much older controlling husband. The NY context is the Washington Heights neighbourhood which is colourful and multi-cultural. Ana speaks no English and has no documents so she has a tough life. The 1960s setting in NY is one of the strengths of this story. Thanks Amy, for this recommendation.
Surfacing – Margaret Atwood
An early Atwood treasure from the 1970s with beautiful descriptive writing – this description off a restaurant meal is on page 1: “two restaurants which served identical grey hamburger steaks plastered with mud gravy and canned peas, watery and pallid as fish eyes, and french fries heavy with lard”. Is your mouth watering? The narrator is an un-named young woman who travels to a remote lake in Northern Quebec with three friends, to seek her missing father. There is an eerily effective transition to sinister happenings, but the true gem of the writing is the unfiltered dialog in the narrator’s head: this story is both spooky and brilliant, a must read.
That’s My Baby – Frances Itani
Ms. Itani has written two superb books about an Ontario community coping with the aftermath of WWI, Deafening (2003) and Tell (2011). This story is about Hanova who learns in 1958 on her 18th birthday that she was adopted as a child. Itani’s exquisite writing is subtle and expressive: the beauty of ordinariness (much like Carole Shields and Alice Munro). Her description of a trip to a dance hall is perfect. Hanora’s life during WWII and her subsequent considerable success as a writer is a major focus of the book, along with her quest for information about her birth parents. Itani’s impeccable writing covers diverse topics like art and music; she is a national literary treasure.
Educated – Tara Westover
This is a remarkable memoir where reality is stranger than fiction. The author was raised in the mountains of Utah. Her parents were survivalists and totally suspicious of government so she had no birth certificate and does not go to school. To say that she was home-schooled is rather generous; her learning is self-directed and spotty. Tara is the youngest of 5 children. Her life is complicated by a controlling father and a brother who bullies her both psychologically and physically. The second half of the book details her escape to university, first to Brigham Young University and then to Cambridge England. This is a compelling story of remarkable resilience but at great cost. The contradictions of memory are also a feature of a memoir that is so deeply emotional. Final comment: Westover’s parents make the parents in Jeanette Wall’s The Glass Castle seem wonderful by comparison! Thanks Erin and Amy, for this recommendation.
The Old Drift – Namwali Serpell
This delightful novel resents a sweeping saga of Africa (Zambia) from 1903 to the future (2024), covering three generations (the grandmothers, mothers and children) of black, brown and white individuals. The challenges of life in Zambia’s transition from colonialism to independence are highlighted graphically: the conflict of wealth and privilege versus poverty, the HIV catastrophe, revolutionary actions, hair, high-tech drones…. In fact, you should be wondering how these diverse topics can be inter-related!. This is a wonderful blend of historical and speculative writing with some great phrases; a married couple is described precisely – “their marriage has ceased to be conjugal; his body did not conjugate hers; there was no grammar between them”.
Akin – Emma Donoghue
An odd couple makes a trip to Nice France. Noah is a 79-year-old recently-widowed childless retired University professor; Michael is his 11-year-old great-nephew who Noah has never met. Their wildly disparate backgrounds create both considerable conflict and humour as they investigate a series of World War II photographs from Noah’s mother. This is a wondrously written story of love, loss and family.
What David Read 