First off, some honesty: When I originally picked up Jessica Chiccehitto Hindman’s Sounds Like Titanic, I thought it was fiction. The premise just did not sound like it was something that actually happened, even though we all know many instances where it was discovered that musicians and singers were not in fact playing their instruments or actually singing live on stage during an event. So alas, today’s selection is in fact nonfiction, and it is a hell of a story.
Genre, Themes, History: This is a nonfiction book that mainly focuses on the time in the author’s life when she worked for someone she will only refer to as The Composer. As one of The Composer’s violinists, Hindman will perform on PBS, QVC, in malls and concert venues all across the U.S, and even in China. Of course, saying that she “performed” in all of these places is being extremely generous. There is only one moment during one performance when she played her violin and the microphones were actually on. All of the music Hindman and her fellow musicians played was prerecorded by other musicians, and then blasted from a portable CD player, while musicians mined the act of performing. Hindman grew up in rural Appalachia, dreaming of becoming a professional violin player. While she knew that dream was not going to pan out by the time she began working for the composer, she still did not take the job knowing the performances would be faked. This part of her life would be a larger theme surrounded by the smaller, but also important ones of reconciling growing up upper middle class, while still barely being able to pay for college, and what she referees to as "life in the body." Life in the body is that unfortunate phenomenon that women usually first find out about in their middle school years. Girls suddenly hate their bodies, and in their attempt to beat it into submission, not for themselves, but for others, they end up jeopardizing their physical, mental, and emotional health. The book is a memoir in the true sense, even touching on Hindman’s aspirations to be a war correspondent stationed in the Middle East.
My Verdict: This book turned out to be much more fascinating than I thought it would be. Sure, it was interesting reading about Hindman’s experience of performing in front of dead microphones while music that sounds eerily seminar to the music from the Titanic soundtrack played from a CD player. But I did not expect for the book to touch on the issues encountered by females in their middle and high school years; or the issue of college student loan debt; or the uselessness of a degree in Middle Eastern studies, even in the U.S. immediately after 9/11. What was strange for me is that the book explores these relatable issues, and yet I did not feel as if I could relate that much. It was weird. But still interesting, and incredibly well written. And naturally, there is already much speculation as to who The Composer could be, but Hindman did not write an exposé. She simply focused on a time in her life that was stranger than fiction.
Favorite Moment: It is in the beginning of the book when the reader learns that The Composer cannot identify Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony, even by its famous da da da duh opening, possibly the four most easily recognizable notes in music, ever.
Recommended Reading: Tara Westover’s Educated is a different kind of memoir, but is written by a woman who ends up following an unconventional road to college and graduate school.
Initially, I was not sure if I was going to pick up Kate Quinn's The Huntress, even though I did enjoy her 2017 novel, The Alice Network. Any consistent reader of this blog knows that I get squirmy when it comes to books about war. Even so, here I am, ready to talk about yet another novel about World War II. Granted, this one mostly takes place immediately after the war has finished, but there is still plenty of talk about Nazi hunting, and post-war feelings about certain cultures.
The Situation: Three individuals are brought together by the same fleeing war criminal. Nina Markova grew up at what she even describes as the end of the world. In icy Russia, she learned to be (almost) completely fearless, while also cultivating a love for flying. It would only be after she spent most of the war as a pilot for the Russian military that she would meet Ian Graham, the brother of an old friend, and someone who is also interested in finding a woman most commonly known as die Jägerin, or the Huntress. Meanwhile, in Boston, Jordan McBride is ready to begin her adult life. While she dreams of going off to college and eventually becoming a great photographer, her father is hoping she will stay close to home and take over the antiques shop. When Mr. McBride suddenly introduces his daughter to a woman he has been seeing, Jordan cannot help the persistent feeling that Anneliese Weber is not who she says she is. But she decides to let go of her suspicions and see her father happy.
The Problem: After her initial suspicions, Jordan has focused on her step-sister
Ruth, doing her best to provide a stable life for a young girl who has
already experienced too much. And after some fairly touch and go investigative work, Ian and his partner Tony, with Nina's help, manage to track die Jägerin to the U.S, and more specifically to Boston. This brings the trio directly into contact with Jordan and her father's antiques shop. With a handful of names and addresses, Ian and Nina find plenty of people attempting to live peaceful lives in the area, and though they should probably have to stand trial for their own war crimes, none of them are die Jägerin. None of them are the woman both Nina and Ian - each for their own reasons - want to track down. While Ian wants justice, Nina wants revenge, and her memories of the war, her time as a pilot, the friends she flew with, and her struggle to survive on her own only fuel her desire to see the Huntress brought down. But as they follow clues that lead nowhere, they know die Jägerin could be slipping through their fingers, and this time it would be even harder to find her again.
Genre, Themes, History: This is a historical fiction novel set in 1940-1950, and across three continents. Nina begins her part of the story slightly before with her history of growing up in Siberia with her father. After discovering a love of planes and flying, she joins the war effort and ultimately becomes one of the Night Witches, an all female group of Russian bombers who worked to push back Hitler's army during World War II. Jordan's story begins in 1946, when her dad has begun dating the beautiful but strange Anneliese Weber, a woman who escaped post-war Germany with her daughter Ruth in tow. Jordan may not trust Anneliese at first, but she soon moves on from her suspicions and the three enjoy a fairly normal domestic life. And then there is Ian, whose entire life, at least since of the end of the war, has been to find die Jägerin and bring her to justice. His partner Tony may describe her as Ian's 'white whale,' the final catch that will given Ian some peace. With the narrators alternating with every chapter, Jordan and Ian's stories are told in a linear fashion, while Nina's gives flashbacks to her time during the war, culminating in her own encounter with the Huntress, and why she is determined to find her. All of the characters may be fictional, but the events and their accomplishments are based on real people, including die Jägerin.
My Verdict: Overall, I enjoyed the book and think it was well-written, thoroughly researched, and a fantastic look at how women are just as valuable (and dangerous) in battle as men. My problem with the book came from realizing very early on how everything was going to unfold, and I was uncomfortable with waiting out 500+ pages while our narrators attempted to find an incredibly dangerous Nazi war criminal, who is more or less right under their noses. I will say that reading about Nina's history, and her journey from cold and harsh Siberia, all the way to Boston with Ian and Tony, was not only interesting, but incredibly entertaining. Her story slowly, but steadily, reveals why she is the way she is by 1950. But often, I had a hard time liking any of the characters, at least for the first two-thirds or so of the book. However, even with my apprehension over the time period, and the focus on war, and my lack of excitement over the focus being a ruthless Nazi, the story culminated in a satisfying ending, and I gained an overall different view of World War II.
Favorite Moment: When Ian becomes hooked on the romance novels that Nina has been reading, though she mostly reads them because they help her with her English...mostly.
Favorite Character: I have a hard time picking anyone from this story as my favorite, and picking Ruth, Jordan's step-sister who escaped Germany with Anneliese, feels like a cheat.
Recommended Reading: I actually enjoyed The Alice Network more, though it is just as stressful. I also recommend Lilac Girls and Lost Roses by Martha Hall Kelly.
It seems that at least once a year I cover a book about race that makes a fair amount of people uncomfortable, for one reason or another, but mostly the massively obvious one. I believe this year's honor will go to Thick: And Other Essays by Tressie McMillan Cottom. As a writer, professor, professional thinker, and acclaimed author, Cottom now shifts gears from her previous book about the troubling rise of for-profit universities, to writing about those things that make people uncomfortable, namely issues of race, gender, class, and the always squirm-inducing political climate. You have been warned.
Genre, Themes, History: Included in Thick is a collection of essays that Cottom had written and published previously, but had either revised or added to them for the publication of this book. There are a total of eight essays, with the first one, titled "Thick," mostly serving as an introduction of sorts. What follows are Cottom's thoughts on beauty and who even gets to enjoy that label; the issue of so-called competency; the importance of black people knowing their whites; why being black in America is not enough; the desire to be fabulous; black girlhood; and Cottom's desire to see just one full-time professional black female opinion writer at a major publication. And while Cottom does pull from her own personal experience and history as a black woman who grew up in the south, and even lived for a time in the north, and ultimately earned a Ph.D. and has made a living out of writing about these subjects, the topics in the essays are also well-researched and thoroughly explored.
My Verdict: The book is an easy read in the sense that it is not long and the essays are so engaging that the pages go by quickly. But it is not an easy read because of the subject matter, as well as the almost brutal honesty with which Cottom talks about these issues. What especially stuck with me is the almost (and often) contradictory terms with which the black female is treated. We are expected to be almost superhuman in our strength and our ability to protect, right up until that ability no longer serves the majority, then we are incompetent in our ability to even take care of ourselves. The word beauty is also not to be applied to black women (as far as pop-culture and capitalism are concerned), but that will not stop the beauty industry from attempting to sell us on their version of "attainable" beauty. And black girls can no longer be victims once men have decided they are desirable - if a black girl is desired enough to be sexually assaulted, then she is old enough to be "ready," and somehow cannot possibly be a victim. Read it again, and slowly. It is a problem. And it is heartbreaking. And yet. Cottom is able to proclaim these truths with humor and wit, while still letting you know that she is incredibly serious, and we should be too.
Favorite Quotes: From "In the Name of Beauty" - "When beauty is white and I am dark, it means that I am more likely to be punished in school, to receive higher sentences for crimes, less likely to marry, and less likely to marry someone with equal or higher economic status. Denying these empirical realities is its own kind of violence, even when our intentions are good. They say that beauty is in the eye of the beholder and ugly is as ugly does. Both are lies. Ugly is everything done to you in the name of beauty. Knowing the difference is part of getting free."
From "Black is Over (or, Special Black)" - "I hate small talk. It is small. Small is for teacups and occasionally for tiny houses. Too much small talk is how a country is given to sociopaths who thrive on shallow chatter to distract their emotional sleight of hand. Talk should be meaningful or kept to a minimum." Testify.
Recommended Reading: Rebecca Traister's Good and Mad would be an excellent follow-up, as would 2016's All the Single Ladies. And there is also last year's squirm-inducer So You Want to Talk About Race by Ijeoma Oluo.
Almost every book list, no matter what kind and what types of books are being listed, makes me both nervous and excited. The excited part is easy to grasp, sure. But I also get nervous because I know I will find something else - probably a lot of somethings - that I will want to read and somehow shoehorn into an already full blog schedule. Ultimately, it is a good thing, but it can quickly become overwhelming. One such list led me to We Cast a Shadow by Maurice Carlos Ruffin. I could not reason my way out of picking up a book by a person of color that can also be categorized as science fiction, and explores a world where black people regularly turn themselves white. And so, the lists win again, as they usually do.
The Situation: The unnamed narrator, in a not-so-distant future, is a black man wanting to desperately receive a promotion at his law firm. Obviously, being able to advance in his career and earn more money would be fantastic, but it is what he plans to do with that money that drives him. His son, Nigel, was born with a birthmark on his face. With a white mother, Nigel does not have skin as dark as his father, but the birthmark on his face has grown and changed over the years, becoming bigger and darker as the boy gets older. One of the newest trends among black people is the process of demelanization, and also the reshaping of distinctly African-American features such as big noses and lips. With a promotion and a bonus from his firm, Nigel's father is hoping to have his son undergo the procedure, but for now he sticks with whitening creams and serums.
The Problem: Getting that promotion and bonus at his firm will be no easy thing. For one, there are currently no black men up on the top floor, and the people that are already there do not have much interest in changing that. The narrator must essentially give the higher-ups what they want, even if that means pretending to believe what he doesn't. Meanwhile, his wife Penny has never been okay with the plan to demelanize their son, and the creams are something she does not know about. It becomes pretty clear that Nigel, even at his young age, is not all that keen on it either. Even so, the narrator is determined, looking to the procedure as a surefire way to save his son and guarantee his success. He has seen enough in his life to know that the only way to survive as a black person in America is to not look like one. But is it always a good thing when parents are willing to do anything for their children?
Genre, Themes, History: This is a fiction novel that takes place at an untold point in the future of the U.S. Though not every book set in the future qualifies as science fiction, I placed this one under that heading more because of the idea of demelanization becoming a normalized thing, as well as a few other details concerning the world that the narrator lives in. What Ruffin presents is a country that has continued to both take away the rights and protections of black people, while simultaneously adding new ones that are somehow just as bad and dangerous. Any area that houses a black family, even just one, receives extra security under the pretense that it is for their protection. And hot topics of today, such as voter registration laws, are taken to the extreme, and no one is even trying to hide what they are really about. The result is people like the narrator: paranoid fathers of young black boys who only want their sons to survive, but somehow end up turning into agents of the enemy. Even Penny, the narrator's wife and Nigel's mother, is against the demelanization of her son. The narrator is a desperate man living in fear, and while I cannot agree with 90% of his logic and reasoning, I certainly understand how he got there. And while I am sure there are literary references I missed, there are some definite moments that point directly to Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man, such as the nameless narrator, and the mention of a boiler explosion at a paint factory.
My Verdict: This one is going to be tough for a lot of people, of all colors and ages. The idea of being afraid to live in your own skin is not new of course, and maybe the reality of that is what is so unnerving. The narrator truly believes that his plan is the way to save his son, despite the mounting evidence that he is going in the wrong direction. The novel made me think, made me anxious, and had moments of true horror without actually being scary per se. What took away from all of this was the actual writing, and the moments when I could not tell if the narrator was simply losing it, or if the writing was just that clumsy. It was often hard to tell, and there are whole passages that beg for more explanation without receiving any. I also worry that the book may be vilifying black men who date or marry white women. I will say this though: I do appreciate the book making the point that a life lived in fear is not a life.
Favorite Moment: *spoiler alert* At no point in any one's life should the words "You are my father" need to be used to stop someone from shooting you.
Favorite Character: Both the narrator's mother and his wife Penny are no fools. Neither approved of what the narrator was trying to do and saw the situation for what it was.
Recommended Reading: This book was compared to The Sellout by Paul Beatty, which in my mind is a masterpiece of a book that deals with racism with both satire and humor. I also recommend Shelter by Jung Yun, or The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison.
The decision to read Stephanie Land's Maid: Hard Work, Low Pay, and a Mother's Will to Survive was mostly made due to the book being available at the UTSA library. I was not quite willing to believe the description on Goodreads that compared it to Evicted by Matthew Desmond (which is a fantastic book by the way); however, I was interested to see in what direction the book would go and how Land's experience would translate to the page.
Genre, Themes, History: This is a nonfiction book, more appropriately categorized as a memoir, that begins before Land became pregnant with her daughter Mia, and ends after Mia is about five years old, though most of the narrative explores the years when the girl is between 2-4 years old. Opening when Mia is taking her first steps in a homeless shelter, Land describes her struggles to secure adequate housing, keep herself and her daughter fed, and of course, secure enough work to stay above water. At one point, Land speaks in detail about the seven different agencies she must make use of simply for her and her daughter to survive. As if being poor and almost constantly near-homeless was not enough, it was incredibly difficult for Land to hold onto/make effective use of the few small benefits she could get, such as the grant for Mia's childcare. Eventually, she would find work as a maid, at first cleaning for companies, but also finding clients on her own. With most of the chapters given titles from the nicknames she gave some of the houses she cleaned, Land talks about each one - what made it a difficult or disgusting job - as well as the people who lived in them. Some she came to know well, others she never met at all, but was able to gather a few clues by what she saw. The book is framed around the experiences she had cleaning these houses, but it is the frustrating red tape that helps keep poor people in poverty that is a constant theme in this book, as well as how other people view them and treat them.
My Verdict: This book is going to be a problem for a lot of readers. When I first saw the book, I imagined an unflinching view of someone who works as a maid in the hotel industry in the U.S, and the struggles they endure to survive and make a life for themselves and their family. With its comparison to Evicted, I was hoping for the same type of personal investigation and research into what it is like to be a maid in this country and clean up after people, while also holding your own life together. Instead, Maid is more of an account of a singular, though relevant, experience. Writer Roxanne Gay said it best: "This is a tightly-focused, well-written memoir, a good book, but it is not a deeply researched book about poverty. This is a book about temporary poverty and it is part of a canon where the goal is to reach the middle-class." Gay also mentions something that many readers will take issue with, and that is the lack of acknowledgement of the white privilege that allows Land to have some of the advantages she does have. There is some mention of the struggles of immigrants and people of color who are in similar situations, but honestly, those are the stories I would rather read.
Favorite Moment: I appreciated any moment when one of Stephanie's clients made an attempt, even a small one, to connect with her and treat her as more than a cleaning service.
Recommended Reading: I recommend Desmond's Evicted, an incredibly, almost painstakingly researched look at how evictions have become big money for some landlords in the U.S, and the people they effect and exploit the most.
First off, some honesty: When I originally picked up Jessica Chiccehitto Hindman’s Sounds Like Titanic, I thought it was fiction. The premise just did not sound like it was something that actually happened, even though we all know many instances where it was discovered that musicians and singers were not in fact playing their instruments or actually singing live on stage during an event. So alas, today’s selection is in fact nonfiction, and it is a hell of a story.
