The Girls by Lori Lansens

I just finished listening to The Girls by Lori Lansens on audiobook, and I was quite pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed it. It took only four days since I listened to it exclusively on my long commutes, and when I wasn’t in the car, I was thinking about it and looking forward to getting back on the road.

The novel tells the story of the amazing life of The Girls, Rose and Ruby Darlen, who are conjoined twins, connected at the head. The story is told mostly from Rose’s point of view as an autobiography, with sections by Ruby interspersed. The two voices on the recording are wonderful, and really bring out the differences in characters between the sisters who are not only identical twins, but have never been apart from each other.

I love stories about twins to begin with, and I deeply enjoy learning about the more technical aspects of being conjoined that Rose describes. But what struck me immediately, right from the first sentence, was the powerful emotional pull of these two girls’ story.

“I have never looked into my sister’s eyes. I have never bathed alone. I have never stood in the grass at night, and raised my arms to a beguiling moon. I’ve never used an airplane bathroom, or worn a hat. Or been kissed like that.” (Punctuation is mine—I transcribed from the recording.)

Rose and Ruby have lived a wondrous and amazing life, overcoming enormous challenges as they grow and mature. However, Lansen’s writing is so perfectly in the girls’ characters that you don’t even notice. You experience their lives as they did—yes, it is at times inconvenient and embarrassing to be joined at the head with your sister, but they went to school, they had crushes on boys, they grew up with their own interests and jobs, and that’s the way it was. But oh, the love that the two had for each other was evident with every word. When Rose muses, near the end of the book, that she would never have given up the love the two sisters shared to be “normal,” I fully believed her.

On a separate note, I want to mention the girls’ Aunt Lovey and Uncle Stash, the couple who takes them in as infants. What a role model they were. They sure brought those girls up right, and their relationship was beautifully rendered as well. The one idea that will stick with me forever is Lovey and Stash’s one word encompassing of all that they mean to each other: “You.”

"You. It’s what Uncle Stash and Aunt Lovey said to each other, perfect in its singularity, throughout their whole married life. It meant, I love you, and other such powerful clichés. You are everything to me, I’ve been so worried about You, I’d die if anything happened to You, I’m sorry if I have hurt You, You have made my life."

I wish you could hear Stephanie Zimbalist reading that passage. It made me tear right up. And every time thereafter, when Stash would put his head against Lovey’s and whisper, “you,” I had to swallow hard and keep my eyes on the road.

The Girls by Lori Lansens

Tags: book+review audiobook conjoined+twins You Lori+Lansens

A Passion for Ice Cream by Emily Luchetti

You know fall is here when the office stays so cold that you have to wear the sweatshirt you keep there for just that purpose all day, but it isn’t quite cold enough to turn on the heater, which is old, very loud, and extremely inefficient. I suppose the sudden darkness one encounters upon leaving the building after work has something to do with it too, now that we are back to Standard time.

Ironically, the book I ordered recently, Emily Luchetti’s beautiful and wondrous cookbook called A Passion for Ice Cream, arrived on this first very chilly day in the Bay Area. I was inspired to get this cookbook because Anita, who keeps one of my favorite blogs, Dessert First, devoted an entire blog post back in August to three items she made from this book. One of them was the “chocolate-coated cocoa nib florentine and orange ice cream sandwiches,” and just the name of it, accompanied by Anita’s amazing photography, convinced me that I needed to get this book, if only to make this one item.

Yeah, yeah, everything else in the book looks incredibly delicious (and not exactly for beginners to make). But if I can pull off the nibby Florentines and orange ice cream dressed with pistachios, the cost of this expensive, full-color hardcover will have been worth it. I don’t think I can wait until summer.

A Passion for Ice Cream by Emily Luchetti

Tags: cookbooks ice+cream dessert Emily+Luchetti

The Confessions of Max Tivoli by Andrew Sean Greer

Disappointment Week- Last Day!

As long as I'm on the subject of books I disliked that critics raved about, The Confessions of Max Tivoli by Andrew Sean Greer deserves a mention.

Again, the premise sounded exactly like one that I would love, mixing a bit of science fiction into a fundamentally realistic world. The central conceit is that Max Tivoli is aging backwards: as he gets older and his mind matures with experience, his body is growing younger. How cool is that?

So many respected sources have loved this book. I really hated it. Maybe it's a testament to how well it's written, but I truly hated the character of Max, who I thought was petty, vindictive, overly dramatic, selfish, and pitiful. I assume that in order for me to feel so strongly about a character, the author must have done something right. Unfortunately, I simply cannot enjoy a book in which the main character makes me want to throw the book at breakable objects.

I think I've had enough negativity for one week. Next week I'll write about books I actually like.

The Confessions of Max Tivoli by Andrew Sean Greer

Tags: book+reviews aging+backward negativity Andrew+Sean+Greer

Mr. Muo's Travelling Couch by Dai Sijie

I probably should have known better than to read Mr. Muo’s Travelling Couch by Dai Sijie. I don’t generally have a great fondness for books that take place in China, since they all seem the same. With this book, however, I was completely suckered in by the title. What a great title! Mr. Muo’s Travelling Couch.

To my credit, the premise of the book is also completely different from the usual Chinese sob story:

After years of studying Freud in Paris, Mr. Muo returns home to introduce the blessings of psychoanalysis to twenty-first-century China. But it is his hidden purpose--to liberate his university sweetheart, now a political prisoner--that leads him to the sadistic local magistrate, Judge Di. The price of the Communist bureaucrat's clemency? A virgin maiden. And so our middle-aged hero Muo, a Westernized romantic and sexual innocent himself, sets off on his bicycle in search of a suitable girl. Muo's quest will take him from a Chengdu mortuary to a rural panda habitat, from an insane asylum to the haunts of the marauding Lolo people. Along the way, he will lose a tooth, his virginity, and his once unshakable faith in psychoanalytic insight. But his quixotic idealism will not waver, even as he comes to see that the chivalrous heart may have room for more than one true love.

Sounds just as good as its title, doesn’t it?

Unfotunately, the book was a Disappointment to me. I got the same feeling as when I read Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami: everything that happened was interesting, but ultimately, I just didn’t care.

Again, I am in complete disagreement with the critics. This book also received a starred review from Publisher’s Weekly, and others had high praise for it. Now that I look at my selection of books this week, I am beginning to wonder if there is something wrong with me.

Mr. Muo's Travelling Couch by Dai Sijie

Tags: book+review disappointments china Dai+Sijie

The Fourth Hand by John Irving

I will confess that I don’t recall too much about The Fourth Hand by John Irving. What I do remember is feeling the need to get in hardcover the minute it came out. Irving’s A Prayer for Owen Meany and The World According to Garp are among my favorite books of all time, and The Cider House Rules is one of my friend L’s favorites. So when Irving came out with a new book back in 2001, I had to have it.

While I can’t recall the details of the plot, even after reading the jacket flap and the Amazon information again, what I do remember is that I was sorely disappointed. I neither liked nor cared about any of the characters, and I couldn’t get past what I considered the completely unrealistic premise (via Amazon):

Television reporter Patrick Wallingford becomes a story himself when he loses his hand to a caged lion while in India covering a circus. The moment is captured live on film, and Patrick (who wears a "perpetual but dismaying smile--the look of someone who knows he's met you before but can't recall the exact occasion") is henceforth known as the lion guy. Before long, plans are made to equip Patrick with a new hand. Doctor Nicholas M. Zajac, superstar surgeon, indefatigable dog-poop scooper, runner, and part-time father, is poised to perform the operation.

But that’s not the unbelievable part. This is:

But the donor--or rather the widow of the donor--has a few stipulations. Doris Clausen wants to meet the one-handed reporter before the procedure, and insists on visitation rights afterward.

Huh?

I guess I never got over that. I found the whole thing outlandish, unrealistic, and flat. While Irving’s works usually work on outlandish and unrealistic, they are never flat.

Again, the critics completely disagreed with me. At least I can fully claim my opinions my own.

The Fourth Hand by John Irving

Tags: book+reviews hand+transplant John+Irving

A Long Way Down by Nick Hornby

I’ve decided that this week will be Disappointment week. It’s happened to all of us: an author we love has a new book out. Despite having almost a hundred books on the TBR pile, we rush out and buy the book in hardcover and start reading it the moment we arrive home, ignoring the other three books in progress at the moment. And it turns out to be a Disappointment.

Yesterday’s disappointment, as you can see, was Tom Robbins’ Villa Incognito. Today’s disappointment is Nick Hornby’s A Long Way Down. The premise of the novel is intriguing: a group of strangers meets one New Year’s Eve on the roof of an apartment building. What do they have in common? They were all thinking of ending their lives that night by plunging to their deaths.

Actually, on second thought, that premise isn’t really that interesting after all. If you give a few moments, you suddenly realize that it’s an almost trite setup-- a setup that practically writes itself. But still, you read it anyway because there might be something there—Hornby might pull off some grander statement about our lives and our shared humanity.

But no. Though each individual character is portrayed realistically and with some depth, pretty much everything that happens to them as a group is unrealistic and shallow. I never believed in them as a group. The development of each character from a suicidal person to a person at peace with who they are depends so heavily on the dynamics within the group that without my emotional investment in the group, the whole story falls apart. It becomes too simplistic to be real.

It’s very odd to me that I would have such an opposite reaction to this book as the critics, such as Publisher’s Weekly, who gave it a starred review and thought that, “This is a brave and absorbing book. It's a thrill to watch a writer as talented as Hornby take on the grimmest of subjects without flinching, and somehow make it funny and surprising at the same time.” School Library Journal writes, “The novel is so simply written that its depths don't come to full view until well into the reading… Tough questions are asked–why do you want to kill yourself, and why didn't you do it? Are adults any smarter than adolescents? What defines friends and family?”

I didn’t think it was any of those things, and I didn’t think the questions addressed made me think about anything on a new level. And don’t you think it’s interesting that A Long Way Down is now considered a YA crossover book?

In honor of Disappointments week, feel free to share yours in the comments.

A Long Way Down by Nick Hornby

Tags: book+reviews disappointments suicide Nick+Hornby

Villa Incognito by Tom Robbins

I have loved many a Tom Robbins book, but Villa Incognito just didn't do it for me. Mostly I felt cheated at the end, that things did not wrap up in a satisfying way, for me at least. The rest of it was just as wacky as usual, but with no deeper meaning. And the nagging feeling that illegal drugs of some sort might have been required to find it.

A few years back, I read a quote from an article on Tom Robbins (originally posted at the Writers Guild of America website, but no longer there). The quote explains a lot about his writing, and, in a funny way, gives Villa Incognito the satisfying ending that I crave. Now that I know how he wrote it, it all makes sense.

"Finally, Tom briefly explained how he wrote his books. He treats writing like a nine-to-five job, writing eight hours a day, Monday through Friday. No writing allowed on weekends. He gets up in the morning, makes himself breakfast, lights a cigar, and sits at his typewriter.

When he starts a novel, it works like this. First he writes a sentence. Then he rewrites it again and again, examining each word, making sure of its perfection, finely honing each phrase until it reverberates with the subtle texture of the infinite. Sometimes it takes hours. Sometimes an entire day is devoted to one sentence, which gets marked on and expanded upon in every possible direction until he is satisfied. Then, and only then, does he add a period.

Next, he rereads the first sentence and starts writing a second, rewriting it again and again until it shimmers. Then, and only then, does he add a period. While working on each sentence, he has no idea what the next sentence is going to be, much less the next chapter or the end of the book. All thoughts of where he is going or where he has been are banished. Each sentence is a Zen universe unto itself, and while working on it, nothing exists but the sentence. He keeps writing in such a manner until he eventually reaches a sentence which he works on like all the others. He adds a period and the book is done. No editing or revising in any way. When you read a Tom Robbins book, you are experiencing the words not only in the exact order that he wrote them but almost in the exact order that he thought them.

But wait a minute, I interrupted. The first sentence of your first book, Another Roadside Attraction, is 'the magician's underwear has just been found in a cardboard suitcase floating in a stagnant pond on the outskirts of Miami'. Are you telling me you wrote that sentence having absolutely no idea where it was leading?

'Yes,' he said. 'I knew I could explain it later. I like painting myself in corners and seeing if I can get out.'"

Villa Incogito by Tom Robbins

Tags: books writing Tom+Robbins

The Merck Manual of Medical Information

L, S and I are sprawled across my living room in various states of recline. At half past midnight, we are sluggish but unwilling to go to bed yet. We are enjoying the slumber-party atmosphere of our girls’ weekend in San Francisco.

“So I saw this movie where Johnny Depp’s nose falls off,” says S. “What disease could make your nose fall off?”

L and I think about this question very seriously.

“Syphilis, do you think?” wonders S.

“I don’t know anything about syphilis. How about leprosy? But I don’t know anything about that either,” I say.

“Yeah, leprosy maybe,” L agrees.

“But doesn’t just your skin come off with leprosy? I don’t know about your whole nose.”

“Hey, I have The Merck Manual. You can look it up. L, grab that big fat red book on the bottom shelf.”

L takes charge of The Merck Manual. While she looks up leprosy, we descend into drowsy silence.

“Hey!” says L. “Listen to this: More than 1 million people worldwide have leprosy. Leprosy is most common in Asia… About 4,000 people in the United States are infected—“

“Wow,” S and I say in unison.

“—most of them in California, Hawaii, and Texas.”

“Hey! L, we live in California!”

“Hmmm. Let’s see. Casual and short-term contact does not seem to spread the disease. Leprosy cannot be contracted by simply touching someone with the disease, as is commonly believed.”

“Well, that’s disappointing.”

“OK, here it is. Damage to the nasal passages can result in a chronically stuffy nose and, if untreated, complete erosion of the nose.”

“Alright, then,” I say. “Leprosy it is.”

“Yup,” agrees S.

L returns The Merck Manual to the bookcase and we gaze at the ceiling in silence.

The Merck Manual of Medical Information

Tags: johnny+depp leprosy medical+reference Merck

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer

Jonathan Safran Foer was in the (blogging) news again today. His book, Everything Is Illuminated, won the JBooks.com's People's Choice Award for the decade's best work of Jewish fiction. The Elegant Variation, where I read the news, was a bit snarky about the honor, and I have detected a bit of anti-Foerism floating around for, as far as I can tell, nothing more criminal than having one’s debut novel become a bestseller before one is thirty years old. I don’t care what anyone says. I think Everything Is Illuminated was one of the best books I’ve ever read.

I do, however, agree with the critics that thought Foer’s second book, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, did not match his first novel in its scope and power. I have been yearning to read something about September 11th that moves me, but while Extremely Loud was touching and intellectually stimulating, it was not quite enough of either.

The main character of the book is Oskar Schell, a precocious nine-year-old who lost his father on September 11th. Despite his wisdom beyond his years, Oskar is still obviously trying to come to terms with his father’s death. When he finds a mysterious key among his father’s belongings, he begins a New York City-wide quest to find the lock it fits. Along the way, his story intertwines with the story of his grandparents, whose lives were blighted by the firebombing of Dresden.

Foer uses many more gimmicky devices in Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close such as pictures, pages full of numbers, and pages of text covered with editing marks. I normally enjoy these untraditional methods of conveying meaning, but all of these fun devices and the disparate stories and puzzle pieces don’t add up the same way that they do in Everything Is Illuminated.

Even though it wasn’t as mind-blowing as his first novel, Foer’s second effort was still a darn good read. I can’t wait to see what he comes up with next. I, for one, am glad he is so young. It gives him all the more time to write more great novels.

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer

Tags: book+reviews jewish+novels september+11 Jonathan+Safran+Foer

Culinary Artistry by Andrew Dornenburg and Karen Page

My friend M and her boyfriend are in town, and we are going to my favorite place on Earth, Restaurant Gary Danko, tonight! In honor of this fine occasion, I offer a quote from Culinary Artistry by Andrew Dornenburg and Karen Page.

"Gary Danko says, ‘Cooking is, for me, the perfect balance of art and science. There’s that creative endeavor within you that can think out the seasons and the flavor profiles. Then there’s the scientific part—what is actually going on with the whisk? If I’m blanching broccoli, why is it turning brown in the pan? As you study that, you learn that sometimes if you cook a lot of vegetables in the same water, an acid will develop. And if you cook a green vegetable in that acidic water, it’s going to turn brown. So these are things you start to learn through science.”

Culinary Artistry by Andrew Dornenburg and Karen Page

Tags: books Gary+Danko chefs Andrew+Dornenburg

Pick Me Up by DK Publishing

In our three-thousand square-foot office space, there is only one room that has a door. It’s about the size of an office, but we use it as our “conference room.” There’s a desk, a few chairs, a small sofa, and bookcases along one wall. It is in this room that we have meetings and I tutor my writing students.

On the floor of this room is a small, overflowing shelf of books I have collected for the sole purpose of lending them to my students. Luckily, all nine of them love reading, and they usually race into our classroom to look at the books before class starts. The new students always have the most amazed expression when they learn that they are allowed to borrow anything on the shelf.

“Can I borrow more than one?” one boy asked. I suggested he finish one book, and then borrow another one next week. “But I can read more than one book a week,” he told me.

“Really?” I asked, because I sure can’t.

“Yeah. I sometimes read a book every day.”

“Well, OK then. You can borrow as many as you like, as long as you can finish them all in one week.”

One particularly popular book on the shelf is an ARC of Pick Me Up: Stuff You Need to Know published by DK. It’s the almanac, or encyplopedia maybe, of the MTV generation. The big, fat book is packed with all kinds of information, trivial and not, that are illustrated with bright colors, photographs, charts, games, and lists. And the information is in no particular order.

Pages 48 and 49 are about the moon landing in 1969, including pictures of the moon, the technology behind the rocket program, the story of the landing, and science fiction trivia. Turn the page and you get a two-page spread about capitalism and economics. Information on this page includes a fake Capitalism game that looks like monopoly, and information about everything from banks to Marxism to free markets. Some pages have you turn to a specific other page to get more information on the same topic. One page has nothing except, in huge lettering, “ARE YOU A GIRL? Turn to page 224.”

It’s pretty hard to describe Pick Me Up, since it’s like nothing I’ve ever seen. Actually, it seems very much like television in book form. While some think it’s a sign that our children are being dumbed down and their attention spans are approaching zero, I rather like this book. It seems bright, energetic, and exciting. It is full of truly interesting, useful, and important information that is presented in a way that is anything but boring. Throw in some gimmicks, some trivia, and a lot of pictures, and you’ve got a kid-friendly educational tool.

It does get borrowed from the lending shelf, that’s for sure.

Pick Me Up by DK Publishing

Tags: children's+books encyclopedia MTV DK+Publishing

The Photographer's Guide to Yosemite by Michael Frye

I got a new toy today! It’s a Canon PowerShot SD630, just arrived on our doorstep this afternoon. E and I were playing with it after dinner. There’s not much to take pictures of right now, except maybe kitties. But it’s the tiniest camera I’ve ever owned, with a whopping three-inch screen on the back. Can’t wait to get outside on a sunny day with it.

Or to Yosemite! Back in January, E and I visited Yosemite in winter for the first time. It was a really short weekend trip, but amazing nonetheless. Everything was covered in snow, and there were almost no people around at all. The few trails we hiked were pristine and quiet, and we could go for half an hour without seeing another soul. I think we will be going back next winter.

Last weekend, at the NCIBA trade show, E spotted on a display table The Photographer’s Guide to Yosemite by Michael Frye. It is a small, slim book, but packed with great information about the entire park, organized by area. Within each area, there are tips about which spots are great for catching good shots. Each spot lists what time of day is best, offers what to look for in different seasons, and references other special sections of the book, such as how to photograph waterfalls, or using filters. There are maps, full color photographs of each place, and the whole thing is packed with photography tips pertaining specifically to capturing the vistas that Yosemite has to offer.

My sales rep generously gave the book to me at the end of the weekend (thanks, Dan!). I can’t wait to give this book and my new camera a spin at Yosemite. Maybe in January.

The Photographer's Guide to Yosemite by Michael Frye

Tags: book+reviews canon+sd630 yosemite kitties Micahel+Frye

The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick

I have in my hot little hands an ARC of The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick, which will be released by Scholastic in the spring of 2007. This will be their blockbuster book next year, I have no doubt. The book is combination of text and images that are interwoven such that part of the story is told in prose, and then it switches to cinematic-style drawings which continue the story before switching back to prose. Back and forth. The illustrations do not merely enhance the story—they are essential to it.

Hugo Cabret is a boy who secretly lives within the walls of a Paris train station keeping the clocks of the station working in his alcoholic uncle’s stead. He soon becomes embroiled in a mystery involving the bitter old man who runs the station toy store, a bookish girl, and his most precious possession, a broken mechanical man—a magician’s automaton that, when working, will reveal a written message.

I was amazed when I saw the automaton described in the book. E and I had seen something just like it at the Forbidden City in Beijing, in the clock museum there! The automaton clock was a part of the imperial collection. It featured a mechanical man in British costume sitting at a desk with a Chinese Calligraphy brush in his hand. When a piece of paper was inserted into the holder on the desktop and its clockworks put into motion, the man’s arm began to move, writing a complete poem in Chinese calligraphy onto the paper. Most amazingly, the brush strokes were perfect, resulting in beautifully formed Chinese characters—better than I could do with a brush, certainly (click on the image to enlarge). And this, done by a completely mechanical machine!

This automaton was perhaps the most memorable thing we saw in the Forbidden City. While the imperial treasures were all impressive and the sheer magnitude of the palace was breathtaking, it was this mechanical man that we still continue to talk about and marvel over, trying to figure out how it was made.

I was surprised to learn, in the author’s note at the end of The Invention of Hugo Cabret, that the fictional automaton in the book was based on an entire collection of similar inventions belonging to French filmmaker George Méliès. Selznick also cites one that he was able to study at the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. I had no idea there were so many of these figures created, all designed to create fantastically impressive drawings and writings.

Roger Sutton, the editor of The Horn Book, wrote briefly on his blog about The Invention of Hugo Cabret last week. He shared a quote that he particularly liked:

[Isabel] walked to the rear door and took out a bobby pin from her pocket. Hugo watched as she fiddled with the pin inside the lock until it clicked and the door opened.

"How did you learn to do that?" asked Hugo.

"Books," answered Isabelle.

That’s exactly what I’m saying.

The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick

Tags: children's+books automatons forbidden+city Brian+Selznick

Millicent Min, Girl Genius by Lisa Yee

I’ve had the ARC of Millicent Min, Girl Genius by Lisa Yee for almost three years now. When I first acquired it, I read about fifty pages before putting it down and deciding not to carry it at Shen’s Books, despite its subject matter (Chinese American girl protagonist) fitting perfectly into our catalog. I will admit, the problem I had with the book was entirely personal and was not related to the quality of Yee’s writing.

School Library Journal:

Millie, an 11-year-old with a genius IQ, is taking a college poetry class and waiting for her high school senior year. Because she never hesitates to show how much she knows about a particular subject, her peers tend to stay away. Millie's social ineptitude is a cause of concern for her parents. Against her will, she is enrolled in summer volleyball and enlisted to tutor Stanford Wong, a friend of the family. Into this mix enters Emily, a volleyball teammate and typical preteen. The girls become friends but Millie neglects to tell Emily about her genius status. Eventually the truth surfaces and Emily feels betrayed. Millie thinks that Emily is angry because she is smart, never realizing that the betrayal comes from her lack of trust in their friendship.

I am sure than many readers find Millicent hilarious, but I did not. Not that I was a child genius or anything, but as the only Chinese person in my entire school, one year younger than my peers, and getting high grades, other kids assumed I was. I spent my childhood trying not to be Millicent Min. I didn’t try to act dumb, but I was very conscious of making an effort not to seem conceited or showy about my grades.

Obviously, Millicent has no social skills, while I rather like to think I had some, at least. I couldn’t believe that anyone could be so deficient. For example, on the first day of volleyball, she raises her hand as the coach begins the practice.

“Excuse me?” I ventured, raising my hand once more. I was glad I had had the foresight to bring my tape measure. “I calculated that the net is several centimeters too high, making the conditions for playing less than perfect.”

Yes, I can see the humor there, but unfortunately, I can’t bring myself to laugh. I’m too angry at Millicent for being the Chinese Girl Everyone Hates. I’m also angry at Millicent for having such an inflated opinion of herself and her intellect when she is so clearly lacking in every other aspect of her life. And I’m mad at her parents for allowing her to become this way, and to graduate from high school at twelve when she hasn’t shown any signs of maturity.

Despite these things, I have decided to give the book another shot for two reasons. One is that a good friend of mine, an Asian-American woman and children’s fiction writer herself, thought it was well-written and a good read. She also said that she understood my feelings, and that the sequel, Stanford Wong Flunks Big-Time, was better in that regard. And I can’t read the sequel without having read the first book!

The other reason is that I have been reading Lisa Yee’s blog recently, and I have really been enjoying Yee’s writing and her wit. It makes me want to try reading Millicent Min, Girl Genius from a perspective unburdened of all my childhood baggage. Because I admire Yee’s ability to touch readers of all ethnicities, to make twelve-year-old girls laugh at Millicent’s foibles, and to represent real, contemporary Asian Americans in children’s literature.

So I’m just about fifty pages in again, but this time I’m going to keep going. I’ll see Millicent through to the end.

Millicent Min, Girl Genius by Lisa Yee

Tags: children's+books Chinese+American child+genius Lisa+Yee

Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe

I have something to confess, something that has been on my chest for almost twenty years now. I will now proclaim it openly to the world, and hopefully my guilt will be assuaged.

When I was about twelve years old, my parents decided that I should read some "quality literature" during the summer. They bought a small stack of "classics" that I was supposed to read, one of which was Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe.

I never read it.

There. It's out there. Not only did I not read it, but I didn't read half of the other books in the pile. And I told my parents I did. I even casually talked about some of the plot points that I particularly enjoyed: those from the jacket blurbs. They believed me, and I have had to lie ever since, whenever the titles come up. But I will lie no more! I never read Robinson Crusoe!

Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe

Tags: books guilt reading+classics Daniel+Defoe

Shabanu by Suzanne Fisher Staples

There’s a really wonderful conference on multicultural children’s literature called Reading the World that is held every spring in San Francisco. There is always an amazing lineup of keynote speakers and session presenters. For example, this year Ed Young, Linda Sue Park, and Katherine Patterson were all there together, along with twenty or thirty other authors and educators.

One of the best aspects of Reading the World is its intimate nature. With only a few hundred attendees and so many authors, you might find yourself walking down the hall with Nikki Grimes, or grabbing a muffin with Alma Flor Ada. Everyone is so friendly and accessible that you feel like you can just chat with the nearest passing Newbury author.

Shen’s Books has been one of the designated booksellers for the conference for several years now. Each bookseller is assigned a group of speakers and it is one of our jobs to ensure that each author’s books are represented for purchase by the attendees. Two years ago, I was assigned, among others, Suzanne Fisher Staples.

Of course I was familiar with all of Staples’ books, but I distinctly remember thinking how embarrassing it was that I had not read any of them. When it was time for her signing, she came to our booth where I had cleared a spot on a table for her. And then I didn’t know what to say. I wished I had read anything of hers so that I could bring it up, but I had nothing.

Despite my many, many encounters with famous authors, I am still entirely inept when it comes to making conversation with them. Actually, I shouldn’t blame authors—I’m fairly inept in any social situation that involves people I don’t know well. In any case, I tripped over myself with a few inanities and decided it would be better not to say anything at all than to say something stupid. We got through the signing, but Suzanne Fisher Staples probably thinks I’m a very unfriendly person.

A few weeks ago, I was flipping through the journal I keep of the books I’ve read. It used to include a paragraph or two of my thoughts on each book, but has, in the last few years, become just a list of titles, authors, and the date I finished each book. And there, there in black and white, there it is: "October 20, 1999: Shabanu by Suzanne Fisher Staples."

That is how bad my memory is.

Shabanu by Suzanne Fisher Staples

Tags: children's+books pakistan reading+the+world Suzanne+Fisher+Staples

Love, etc. by Julian Barnes

When Love, etc. by Julian Barnes came out, I knew of course that I would eventually read it. I have read most of Barnes' work, including his Talking it Over, so I wasn't going to skip the sequel.

I remember reading a review at the time, before I even bought the book, in which the reviewer claimed that Love, etc. was "alarmingly perfect." While that seems like a backhandedly positive thing to say about a book, I can't help but wonder what that really means. What criteria could there possibly be by which a novel can be deemed 'perfect,' and, going further, how could such perfection be 'alarming'? It sure sounds like a witty turn of phrase, but it doesn't make any sense to me.

Love, etc. by Julian Barnes

Tags: book+reviews Julian+Barnes

The Birdfeeder's Handbook by Sheila Buff

In 2004, E volunteered for a local organization that was helping the Kerry-Edwards campaign. One of the activities for volunteers was neighborhood canvassing, but it was understood that campaigning in California was a waste of time since it was certain to go blue anyway. So the group organized trips for volunteers to travel to Nevada, a swing state, to walk the neighborhoods.

I agreed to go on one of these trips because anything is more fun than sitting at home, and because E promised that we would do fun things on our own, too. In addition to knocking on doors in conservative neighborhoods.

Host families were arranged for all the volunteers, and ours was a very nice couple, Mr. and Mrs. K, who lived not far outside Reno. Their neighborhood reminded me of where I grew up, in Westchester County, New York. The area wasn’t as developed as our Bay Area, and there were pockets of housing, and winding roads, among the trees of the forest. It could have been a place like Chappaqua rolled up, shipped across the country, and unfurled in northern Nevada at the base of the Sierras. We arrived late on a Friday night, and as we looked for their address, I felt very much at home.

The Ks had a beautiful, large home nestled in the trees. In the morning, they prepared a simple breakfast for us out on their back patio. I thought I was in heaven. The Ks had no houses within sight behind their house, just trees. These woods were not dense, but rather open and airy, with no underbrush between the tall pines.

My favorite part of their backyard, however, was a large flat area of tamped dirt adjoining the patio. In this area were several free-standing birdfeeders. As we ate breakfast, Mrs. K refilled the feeders and scattered seed and nuts onto the flat ground. Immediately, birds flew in from every direction to have their own breakfasts, while knowledgeable squirrels and chipmunks darted out from their hiding places to grab what goodies they could. I was delighted. I didn’t want to ever leave this Eden.

Soon after we returned home, I found my self at a library book sale, and I happened across the book I needed: The Birdfeeder’s Handbook by Sheila Buff. We may not live in the woods, but we do have a redwood tree in our backyard. Once I read the book, we’ll have a wilderness menagerie yet.

The Birdfeeder's Handbook by Sheila Buff

Tags: books birds reno kerry+campaign Sheila+Buff

Luscious Lemon Desserts by Lori Longbotham

They say there are only two kinds of people in the world: chocolate people and lemon people. While I do love chocolate for sure, I am a lunatic for all things lemon.

Every single recipe in Luscious Lemon Desserts by Lori Longbotham sounds heavenly, and I can't wait to try all of them. Here's one I have tried, a taste of luscious lemony comfort food:

Lemon Pudding

3/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup cornstarch
2 1/2 cups milk
3 large egg yolks, lightly beaten
2 tbsp finely grated lemon zest
pinch of salt
1/2 cup fresh lemon juice
2 tbsp unsalted butter at room temperature

1. Whisk together the sugar and cornstarch in a medium saucepan. Add the milk and whisk until smooth. Add the egg yolks, zest, and salt and cook over medium heat, stirring frequently at first and constantly toward the end, until thickened.

2. Remove the pan from the heat and stir in the lemon juice and butter. Pour through a strainer into a large serving bowl or 4 individual serving dishes. Let cool to room temperature. Refridgerate, loosely covered, for at least 2 hours or up to 3 days, until set and thoroughly chilled. Serve chilled.

Luscious Lemon Desserts by Lori Longbotham

Tags: cookbooks lemon+pudding Lori+Longbotham

American Born Chinese by Gene Yang

I left the office a few hours early today to set up our table at the Northern California Independent Bookseller’s Association (NCIBA) regional trade show this weekend. I was going to leave at 4:00, but I was afraid of getting to Oakland at the precise moment the A’s game let out, so I went an hour early. Which is nice on a Friday.

Set-up was quick and easy, thanks to two burly men at the loading dock who carried my boxes in for me. I think we have a pretty good location this year—for the first time, we are sharing a “table island” with Scholastic. So maybe we’ll get lots of traffic from people interested in children’s books.

I picked up a show program and went right for the author autographing information. The first name that caught my eye was Gene Yang, who has a new book out this season called American Born Chinese. It’s a graphic novel, and it is in fact the first graphic novel I have chosen for the Shen’s Books catalog.

I haven’t read many graphic novels, so I can’t speak from a comparative point of view. But I did like American Born Chinese for a few reasons. First, it weaves three different story lines into one book. The main storyline involves Jin Wang, a Chinese-American boy who, despite being born in the U.S. and being completely American culturally, doesn’t fit in at his new school and reluctantly befriends the only kid there who is newer than him: Wei-chen, a boy who has just arrived from Taiwan.

This plot line does not exactly cover new ground. However, Yang’s graphic depiction of the experience is more poignant than the usual prose treatments, and the other two stories act as mirrors that reflect their own voices upon Jin’s story, giving it new meaning. Interspersed between episodes are segments from the Chinese Monkey King legend and a “TV sitcom” featuring Chin-Kee, a stereotyped caricature of a Chinaman. The three very different directions play off each other, highlighting and emphasizing what each cannot say on its own.

For example, Jin is always on some level embarrassed by the Chinese-ness of his new friend, but it is not until we see Chin-Kee behaving badly that we understand exactly what Jin is afraid of. At the same time, we can see that the brave and quick-witted Monkey King is also an image that the Chinese have of themselves. The two cannot be separated so easily.

There seems to be a lot of positive buzz about American Born Chinese this season. I’m glad that the publisher, First Second, is publishing graphic novels with a slightly new feel, with thought-provoking characters and issues. I am looking forward to meeting Gene Yang tomorrow, and to have him sign my copy of the book.

American Born Chinese by Gene Yang

Tags: book+review graphic+novel Chinese+American Gene+Yang

Power Yoga for Beginners by Liz Lark

I took a yoga class once.

It was nice. I liked it. But the schedule was bad for me, and it’s difficult to take classes because of the length of my commute. It makes the timing very awkward, especially for someone who has to eat every three hours. Trust me. And no, I will not get up before 7:00 for any reason.

But because I had liked the one class I took, I thought Power Yoga for Beginners might be a good way to do yoga at home, at my own leisure. I chose it because it has a unique design: it is spiral- bound and features a fold-out stand that holds it upright. The idea is that while you are doing the yoga poses, you can still see each page without twisting your neck and back in funny ways.

It doesn’t work at all. Let’s just say that it is impossible to read any book, no matter how specially designed it is, while doing yoga. I can’t believe I fell for that.

So I’ve given up on yoga for now. But maybe I can find a good podcast…

Power Yoga for Beginners by Liz Lark

Tags: book+reviews yoga+classses Liz+Lark

The Complete Calvin and Hobbes by Bill Watterson

For someone who majored in music theory and history, I sure wasn’t very good at music theory and history. But by my senior year, we had gotten enough mandatory theory sequences that we were allowed to choose the next two theory courses from a list of… four. I chose two counterpoint classes for my last two semesters, the first of which was a Renaissance counterpoint class.

The professor of this class was the late David Lewin, a formidable figure we had often seen in the hallways of the music building. He would shuffle by with his head down, grunting in response to a greeting, or walking right by us without acknowledgement. He may have been the only music department staff member who was too scary to approach casually. This was probably one reason there were only four other students who chose this class. I suppose the lack of interest in Renaissance-style polyphony, or “species counterpoint,” was also a contributing factor. In any case, a class of five was great.

I was happy to discover that I was actually pretty good at this style of counterpoint. It was very rule-based, and writing lines of music in this style reminding me more of puzzles and math than of music. The five of us were also surprised to find that Professor Lewin was a laid-back and loose teacher with a sharp sense of humor. The persona that was so terrifying to us before was in fact not a reflection of some grumpy ill-will, but rather a result of the complete absorption of his concentration on whatever genius was occurring inside his head as he walked from one place to another.

Some of this genius appeared in a thick packet of paper he handed out on the second day of class. The packed was composed entirely of pages filled with doctored comic strips. (click on the strips to enlarge)

Let’s recap. The distinguished composer, theorist, counterpoint expert, and senior professor David Lewin sat in his office thinking up jokes to fill in the bubbles of Calvin and Hobbes cartoons. He then found the perfect font to print the words in, then cut and pasted the scraps of text into the word bubbles of photocopied comic strips. Not only that, but the alternate text fit the panels perfectly and were truly funny, in a music-nerd sort of way. How much did I love this professor?!

Everyone knows that Bill Watterson is a comic and artist genius. Everyone knew that Professor Lewin was a brilliant music theorist. Who knew they would go so well together?

The Complete Calvin and Hobbes by Bill Watterson

Tags: cartoons music+theory renaissance+counterpoint David+Lewin Bill+Watterson

Clementine by Sara Pennypacker, pictures by Marla Frazee

Clementine by Sara Pennypacker is going to be the next big thing in transitional chapter books. Everyone loves spunky girls who are creative and imaginative. Girls who find themselves in hilarious and crazy situations, but are really just good kids at heart.

When I was little, I was not one of those girls. I was small, quiet, and very well-behaved. I don’t think I ever saw the inside of a principal’s office, and I was almost afraid of the boisterous kids. Like their energy might knock me off my feet if I got too close. Now, when I read children’s books, I’m not usually drawn to these crowd-pleasing spunky gals—I can’t really relate.

What is so wonderful about Clementine, though, is not necessarily the character of Clementine herself, who is in many ways a typical third-grade heroine of contemporary children’s literature. Rather, it is Sara Pennypacker’s amazing way with words that is so delightful. Clementine’s voice is so charming, funny, and refreshing that even I was won over by her spunk.

From the very first page, Clementine’s fun, no-exposition-necessary voice comes shining through:

I have had not so good of a week.

Well, Monday was a pretty good day, if you don’t count Hamburger Surprise at lunch and Margaret’s mother coming to get her. Or the stuff that happened in the principal’s office when I got sent there to explain that Margaret’s hair was not my fault and besides she looks okay without it, but I couldn’t because Principal Rice was gone, trying to calm down Margaret’s mother.

Someone should tell you not to answer the phone in the principal’s office, if that’s a rule.

Okay, fine, Monday was not so good of a day.

That Pennypacker got the whole story of Margaret’s hair told in one sentence is genius. And, now that I think about it, no one ever told us not to answer the phone in the principal’s office when we were kids either.

Clementine’s week just gets worse from there, but she does have the opportunity to use her creativity to help her dad with a pigeon problem and her kindness to make up with her best friend. At the very end of the week, when it seems like the worst thing in the world will happen to her, my eyes welled up and I began to sniffle a little. Then, when she gets a very pleasant surprise instead, I cried I was so happy for her.

I wouldn’t be surprised to see many more episodes of Clementine’s life arriving in the next few years. There is no way the world will let this be the last of this delightful girl's adventures.

Clementine by Sara Pennypacker, pictures by Marla Frazee

Tags: children's+books imagination pigeons Sara+Pennypacker

How to Cook Everything by Mark Bittman

There’s something to be said for having an appreciative audience for one’s cooking. After all, the most galvanizing culinary force I have is E. I love when, out of nowhere, he will say something like, “ooh, let’s have rice pilaf.” Even though neither of us really knows what rice pilaf is (I am assuming what comes out of a Rice-a-Roni box can’t possibly be an authentic rendition of it), I suddenly have a purpose—a quest. I will search all my recipe books for a recipe for rice pilaf, go to the grocery store just to get the ingredients for the one dish, and spend an extra hour standing by the stove to produce it for him. These are the only moments I truly enjoy cooking.

Yesterday morning, E got it into his head that he wanted French toast for breakfast. He probably came up with idea because there has been a stale loaf of French bread sitting on the kitchen counter since Thursday. I was spurred into action. I pulled out my copy of Mark Bittman’s How to Cook Everything, and there was indeed a very simple recipe for French toast. It involved only two eggs and a surprisingly large amount of milk—a whole cup. I added a dash of cinnamon and vanilla extract, and I was ready to go.

With the French bread slices, my first completely successful venture in French toast territory was a resounding success. It looked exactly like restaurant French toast. Once again, E and I wondered why we should ever leave our house again.

How to Cook Everything is an amazingly useful cookbook. If you were to only own one cookbook, this would be it. After all, it tells you how to cook everything. So far, there hasn’t been anything E has suddenly decided he wants to eat that I haven’t found in this book. And every recipe I’ve tried has been great. Granted, it covers only basic, fresh cooking, but if you’re learning how to cook something new, this is a great start. Besides the minimalist versions of each dish (which Bittman excels in), he also offers a few variations to change things up. But with almost a thousand pages of recipes, there’s little fear of running out of things to make. I just can’t believe I lived so long without it.

How to Cook Everything by Mark Bittman

Tags: cookbooks rice+pilaf french+toast Mark+Bittman