The Parisian by Isabella Hammad

 Monday, Apr. 26, 2021--San Antonio

The Parisian by Isabella Hammad was named on a number of lists of the best books of 2019.  It is the story of one man from Palestine who was sent to a boarding school in Constantinople in the time of the Ottoman Empire for his secondary education and was sent to France where he studied medicine in Montpelier and other subjects at the Sorbonne through the period of WWI.  But it is also the story of the whole of the Middle East and, in particular, Palestine, from the time of the Ottoman Empire when Palestine was a part of Greater Syria through WWI, the partitioning of the region by France and England, and the increasing immigration of Jews into the area after WWI and as WWII approached.  There is a emphasis on the efforts to establish a Palestinian State throughout that time period that has failed due to harsh rule by the Ottomans and the British during the period of the novel (and has continued to be thwarted long after the novel ends as the country of Israel was eventually took control of the rest of the land area of Palestine after fighting wars with its neighbors).  It's a complex story dealing not only with the history of this man and his home region, but with the young man's appreciation of French culture, his love of a French woman while living in France,  the customs and expectations for a young man from the Middle East, and the extent to which a family will go to enforce the young to comply with those customs and expectations.  The history of the area is such a big part of the story that at times I felt it strayed the story of the central character for period of time that were too long.  But overall, both stories make compelling reading.  I gave the book 4 stars out of 5.

The Kitchen House by Kathleen Grissom

 Sunday, Mar. 21, 2021--San Antonio

The Kitchen House by Kathleen Grissom is a book gifted to me by friends who had read it.  It takes place on a plantation in Virginia in the late 1700s/early 1800s.  Unlike other plantation novels that emphasize the relationships between the white owners and the black slaves, this one brings in a major character who leaves Ireland on a ship with her family which is contracted to be indentured servants in America.  When her parents both die during the passage, the captain, who uses his ship to financially support his family plantation, brings the girl to live out her indentured servitude at the plantation.  Female slaves there fall into two main categories--house slaves and field slaves.  The girl is assigned to live in the kitchen house, an outbuilding where the cooking takes place, and to assist there with cooking plus having chores assigned to her in the big house.  Unlike other whites on the plantation, she lives with the slaves who become like family to her.  This sets up a contrast in outlook and reaction for her vs. the white family members and the white overseer.  The story covers approximately 40 years.  So many of the turns in the story are based on a persons making wrong assumptions and persons not speaking up to clarify the situation that has caused the wrong assumption.  Almost everything that goes wrong in the story is due to this.  Eventually, I found myself wanting to yell at some of the characters for the poor decisions they were making.  They story is easy to read and moves at a fast enough pace, but I lost respect for it as the poor decisions piled up toward the end.  I rated it 3 1/2 stars out of 5.

The End of Loneliness by Benedict Wells

 Sunday, Mar. 7, 2021--San Antonio

The End of Loneliness by Benedict Wells is a book originally written in German and translated into English.  It won the European Prize for Literature in 2016, is listed among the 100 German must-read books, and was on the best seller list in Germany for almost two years.  It took all of Europe and eventually much of the world by storm due to its translation into many languages.  The book is essentially the story of a family concentrating on the lives of the three children after the sudden death of their parents,  the friends and relationships they have, and especially on the life of one of those children.  The story flows easily for the reader, and the characters are all interesting.  The book, although well reviewed and a prize winner, is often referenced as a tearjerker.  I enjoyed it and read it rather quickly.  I gave the book a rating of 5 stars out of 5.

The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga

Tuesday, Mar. 2, 2021--San Antonio

The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga won the Man Booker Prize in 2008.  It is a delightful novel--funny, interesting, and far more entertaining than the film version which was recently released on Netflix.  As a person who has traveled independently to India 6 times and has observed the relationships that exist there in small communities and big cities between those who have money and those who are the working poor, I found the descriptions of life and of interactions between people of different "stations" in life to be so authentic.  Balram, the main character, is poor and from a small village.  What makes the novel so much fun to read is the way that he expresses himself at times--both the structure of his sentences and the observations he has made of life.  I often found myself laughing aloud.  The book as a whole, however, is also about far more than this man's life; it is about the problems faced by everyone in just getting by in India due to dysfunctional government agencies, corruption, moral contradictions, the perpetuation of the caste restrictions in informal ways (since they formally are banned by law), etc.  If you read this novel, you will get a vivid picture of what life is like in India and what people of all standings in the country face in trying just to live their lives.  I gave the book 4 1/2 stars out of 5.

Arthur and George by Julian Barnes

 Thursday, Feb. 18, 2021--San Antonio

Aurthur and George by Julian Barnes was my first book to read during the GREAT TEXAS WINTER STORMS (two bouts of freezing rain followed by 4" of snow within a 5-day period and the longest period of below-freezing temperatures in the history of records here in San Antonio) of 2021.  I had waited a week since finishing my previous book to start another because I needed to spend time on other things.  But then the storm hit and I had no electricity, no Internet, no heat except from a gas fireplace, etc.  I couldn't download another book due to the Internet being out, so I started searching my bookshelf for a book I hadn't yet read that sounded interesting.  Arthur and George is a combination of the stories of the lives of Arthur Conan Doyle (who wrote the Sherlock Holmes stories) and George Edalji, the quiet son of an Indian Church of England priest and his Scottish wife, who grows up being teased and discriminated against.  The first part of the book covers their lives separately by going back and forth to tell their stories of growing up.  Then the story turns only to George to tell of a crime he is accused of committing, his trial, and his time in prison.  From there, the story turns back to Arthur to tell about his marriage, his interest in spiritism, and his life with a second woman.  He becomes aware of the miscarriage of justice against George, born and raised in England but never accepted as British because of his heritage.  The book continues with Arthur working to get George a pardon and compensation for his miscarriage of justice.  It continues with Arthur's eventual marriage to the second woman after his first wife's death, his continued investigation of spiritism, and his eventual death.  It is not a biography, but it is built around true facts and told as historical fiction; it even has an afterward which tells what eventually happened to all the major characters following the point in time when the novel ends.  I found sections of the book to be extended too long and of little interest to me.  And it was too many stories within one book--the story of Arthur's life, the story of George's life, the story of discrimination in England, the story of a true crime series that occurred, and the story of spiritism and those who believe in it.  It was a finalist for the Booker Prize and I enjoyed it most of the time; as a compromise due to the multiple stories being jumbled together and my lost interest at times, I rate it 3 1/2 stars out of 4.

The Prophets by Robert Jones, Jr.

 Feb. 5, 2021--San Antonio

The Prophets by Robert Jones, Jr., is his first novel.  It was one of the most anticipated books of January, 2021 with more than 20 major recommendations including TIME, the New York Times, the Washington Post, Entertainment Weekly, Cosmopolitan, etc.  It is the story of the people on a plantation in Mississippi, but it is mainly the story of the slaves there including the lingering memories that have been carried forward by word-of-mouth of where their people came from, how they traveled to America, and what happened to them over time in America and specifically on this plantation.  It is unflinchingly specific about the treatment they have received as captives and slaves.  The reader learned that they have retained certain knowledge of their own culture and understandings even after generations in America even when separated from others of their families and tribes.  There are many major characters in the book--the owner of the plantation who is harsh but maybe not as much as some other slave owners, his cousin who is the overseer of the slaves and thinks that the owner should be more harsh, the house slaves who have suffered greatly over time even though their living conditions are a bit better than those of the field slaves, the slave who maneuvers to have a higher position by adopting the religion of his owners and seeks permission to preach to the other slaves and who eventually positions himself as the arbiter of what is right and wrong within the slave colony, the son of the plantation owner who has been North for college and has no interest in taking his father's role when the time comes, the wife of the plantation owner who had many miscarriages before the son was born and has developed mental instability due to it, etc.  But the two central characters the story revolves around at least half the time are two young men barely past puberty who are in charge of the barn and its animals, have been friends since childhood, who are quite different in each of their outlooks toward life, but whose friendship has turned into a loving sexual relationship over time.  I found it difficult at times to comprehend what the author was trying to communicate with his rather "lofty" language, but the stories of all the characters were fascinating to read.  I gave the book 4 stars out of 5.

Sing to It by Amy Hempel

 Tuesday, Jan. 26, 2021--San Antonio

Sing to It by Amy Hempel is a collection of short stories.  Several are very short--between 1 1/2 and 2 1/2 pages long.  Hempel seems to have a knack for thinking thoughts and her idea of their meanings or her impressions related to them.  That's what the shortest stories are.  But even the longest story in the book has many of these short thoughts inserted among the ongoing information that creates the broader story.  It's easy to read her writing, and her expressions are delightful in relation to her thoughts.  I spent more time on this book than most because I have had more things going on in my life while reading it and because I had become a bit tired of reading one book after another every 4-7 days.  My rating for the book is 3 1/2 stars out of 5.