"The Privileges"

Reading "The Privileges" (Random House, 2010), by Jonathan Dee, made me feel a little soiled, a little sad, and a little mad. Dee portrays amoral, materialistic, unlikeable characters: Adam, a financier (doing something obscure, complicated, secret, and illegal with hedge funds, insider trading, and the like), his wife Cynthia, their children, and their friends. The fact that the couple eventually become philanthropists doesn't erase their essential negative characteristics: from the opening scenes before, during, and after their wedding, they think of themselves as special, invincible, and above the normal rules. I know that Dee is giving us insight into a very wealthy stratum of American families, and a substratum of those families who achieve their wealth through Wall Street misdeeds; I know too that, as Tom Perotta's back cover blurb says, the novel is "an indictment of an entire social class and historical moment, while also providing a window onto some recent, and peculiarly American, forms of decadence." It is of course good to reveal and critique these dangerous and selfish excesses, and the topic is certainly timely, given our current economic situation and the role of Wall Street in bringing us to this destructive place. But the book itself is disturbing. The sense of entitlement shown by the characters is astonishing. At one point Adam, in a rare moment of introspection, justifies his illegal practices to himself, thinking "he had done what he'd had to do...to get them all...to that place of limitlessness that she [his wife] so deserved and that he had always had faith they would occupy" (p. 170). I am actually very interested in the topic of privilege; I have addressed the subject myself in my academic writing. I admit that I started reading "The Privileges" partly because of the topic, and partly because I have a predilection for novels taking place in the affluent sections of Manhattan -- a sort of guilty pleasure. I must admit that the novel is well written. But still, I had a visceral negative reaction to it, and I can't recommend it to others.

Books for my Mom

My wonderful mother was widowed six years ago, and moved to a retirement home last year. After a lifetime of working, raising four children, and running households in three countries, she no longer needs to cook meals or do housework in her new apartment. One delightful result is that she has more time to read than she has ever had before, which she is enjoying. One of my great pleasures is supplying her with books. Of course she has, buys, and borrows books on her own, but because I read so many reviews and go to bookstores and libraries more often than she does, I have more opportunities to find books for her. One of my best sources is the monthly Friends of the Library book sale at my beautiful local library. The sale is filled with huge quantities of books, all donated and only very slightly used, nicely organized and shelved, the vast majority of them for sale at only a dollar or two per book. I often leave with a pile of 10 or 20 books, a few for myself but mostly for my mom. The next time I see her, I deliver a bag or two full of carefully chosen books. I know her taste fairly well. And even if I mistakenly choose a book that she has already read, or doesn't care for, at a dollar or so, she can simply pass it along to a friend or to the small library in her retirement complex. I have always given my mother books for Christmas and her birthday, but this new, more regular choosing and giving of books is a happy experience for both of us.

Book Business

Jason Epstein has been one of the great figures in the publishing world for the past 50+ years. Among his achievements are the following: starting the quality paperback revolution with Anchor Books in 1952, when he was just 22 years old; co-founding the New York Review of Books; co-creating the Library of America; and being editorial director of Random House for 40 years. He has won several prestigious prizes. In 2001, he published a book titled "Book Business: Publishing Past Present and Future" (Norton), a combination of a memoir and a history of the publishing business over the past century or so. I have just finished reading the book with great enjoyment. Epstein seems to have known everyone in the Manhattan world of books and the arts, including Vladimir Nabokov, Norman Mailer, Philip Roth, Gore Vidal, Robert Lowell, Elizabeth Hardwick, Bennett Cerf, Hannah Arendt, Edmund Wilson, W. H. Auden, Frank O'Hara, John O'Hara, Ralph Ellison, John Ashbery, and Andy Warhol. He describes the evolution of the "book business," and its devolution as it became more corporatized over the past 25 years or so. Although he loves books and has spent his whole life devoted to them, he thinks it is inevitable that the Internet will change the publishing business beyond recognition. Surprisingly, he is cautiously optimistic that if we are open to innovation, the results may have positive aspects. His mixed feelings are clear in a recent (March 11, 2010) New York Review of Books article, in which he says he would be bereft without his huge collection of physical books, but he sees "the inevitability of digitalization as an unimaginably powerful, but infinitely fragile, enhancement of the worldwide literacy on which we all -- readers and nonreaders -- depend." Personally, I am still very resistant to digitalization or to anything that threatens the primacy of "real books," physical books in the hand, but I am impressed that such a figure as Epstein is able to look to the positive (more availability, instant updates, infinite storage, on-demand publishing, etc.). Let me finish by saying that "Book Business" is very readable and informative, and the occasional gossipy anecdote about the literary world adds to the enjoyment. (By now, you have probably figured out that I enjoy literary gossip!) Parenthetically, Jason Epstein also loves fine food, and in 2009 published a book called "Eating," a sort of food memoir/recipe book/ode to good food and good times; I recently read this book as well, and savored it thoroughly.

Recycling Books

I think it is wonderful when an individual copy of a book is read by several people. Books should be recycled, kept in circulation, for maximum value and effect. Let me count the ways that books can be recycled. Libraries, by definition, circulate each book to many readers, sometimes dozens or even hundreds. Used bookstores take in previously read books from owners and resell them to the next owners. Books can be given to charities for resale, with the funds going to good causes (back into the library, in the case of Friends of the Library). Books can be passed on to friends. They can be kept on shelves in shared spaces such as workplaces, apartment or condo community rooms, and community centers, where they are available to many readers. Although there is a pleasure in taking ownership of a crisp new book, it is also pleasurable to note the signs of prior readers of used books, such as turned down corners, annotations, coffee stains, and postcards or receipts used as bookmarks. You feel a kind of connection with earlier readers of that volume. Most of all, it feels great to know that a book has more than one life with more than one reader.

"Slipstream: A Memoir"

I recently finished reading a fascinating book: "Slipstream: A Memoir" (Macmillan, 2002), by the wonderful novelist Elizabeth Jane Howard. I often enjoy reading memoirs by writers, as they offer insights into those magical people who create new worlds for us as readers to explore. This one is of particular interest to me for several reasons. First, I have read most of Howard's novels, including the addictive, intense quartet about what was happening during World War II back home in England, collectively titled "The Cazalet Chronicles." Second, she apparently knew everyone in the world of English literature, as well as many in the other arts, throughout the second half of the 20th century. A short list of her famous friends and acquaintances includes Sybille Bedford, Ivy Compton-Burnett, Antonia White, Stephen Spender, Elizabeth Taylor, Marc Chagall, Philip Larkin, Penelope Lively, Evelyn Waugh, and many more. She was married three times, including a turbulent marriage to the celebrated but difficult novelist Kingsley Amis, and had romances with many others, including the French novelist Romain Gary. Despite all her publications, her famous friends, her love affairs, and her beauty, she was quite insecure most of her life. Only in old age (she was in her early 80s when she wrote this book) did she find a kind of balance and peace within herself. However, she did have a great talent for friendship, and appreciation of and loyalty to her friends; she also derived great pleasure from nature and gardens, as well as from travel. This brings me to the third reason this book is of interest to me: As with Diana Athill's memoirs (see my 3/15/10 post), it is wonderful to hear from and about a person who has lived a long life and is still writing, still reading, still enjoying life despite some physical illnesses and restrictions. Howard, like Athill, is also very candid about her life, her loves, and her weaknesses; perhaps there comes a point when it is no longer necessary to pretend and conceal the truth? It is also probably easier to be candid when one has outlived many of the people one writes about - family, friends, husbands, lovers, employers, editors, and agents. In any case, I admire Howard's making her way as an often single woman or a woman in a difficult marriage, working, writing, persisting, often short of money and support, at a time when these things were even more difficult for women than they are now. Although it is a bit of a commitment (477 pages), I recommend this memoir to those who are interested in writers' lives, women's lives, and the world of twentieth century English literature.

No Post Tomorrow

Dear fellow readers,
I will be at a conference for the next few days, and may not be able to post an entry every day. Tomorrow (Wed., 3/24), in particular, I will probably not be able to do so. But I will be back and blogging again very soon!
Best, Stephanie

Ode to Librarians

On 1/30/10, I wrote in praise of libraries. But what would libraries be without librarians? Whether at public libraries or at school or university libraries, those wonderful, extremely knowledgeable, very helpful people are the ones who -- among their many responsibilities -- order and keep track of the library's holdings and assist and educate library patrons in so many ways. Fortunately, old stereotypes about librarians seem to have faded somewhat, perhaps because of the increasing complexity of their jobs, including the ever-advancing technological possibilities and demands of the modern library. Some of my favorite people at the university where I teach are librarians. I'd like to send out special thanks to Joe G., who does such a great job teaching my students (as well as many other classes of students) library and research skills every semester. I hereby raise a virtual glass in a toast to Joe and all the other librarians at my university library, my local library, and all libraries everywhere!

"The Feast of Love"

Charles Baxter is a writer I have been vaguely aware of, but I have read very little of his work. He is the author of several novels, short story collections, and poetry collections, as well as nonfiction. I have just finished reading his novel "The Feast of Love" (Pantheon, 2000), which I enjoyed. Although it is a novel, it is a sort of collection of interlocking short stories. Each chapter is told from a different point of view; the main characters have more chapters and the minor characters fewer. The story is set in Ann Arbor, Michigan, to which I feel a connection as I lived in that area for my last two years of high school, and have visited a good friend there many times over the years; this sense of connection and familiarity added to my enjoyment of the book. The novel is seemingly self-referential, as the author himself lived and taught in Ann Arbor for about a decade, and as the framing storyteller/writer in the novel itself is named "Charlie." The book is divided into five parts: Preludes, Beginnings, Middles, Ends, and Postludes, and is loosely a "reimagined 'Midsummer Night's Dream'"; this is not immediately obvious, but once one makes the connection (and it had to be pointed out to me), the echoes and signs are there. Shared topics and aspects include love, loss, sleep, insomnia, dreams, foretellings, unexpected connections, death, reversals, and resolutions. When I was reading the first pages of this novel, I was not sure I was going to like it, but I was gradually drawn into the story. The best thing about it is its compelling characters, who are individual, quirky, vulnerable but strong; they are not always sympathetic, but the author allows us to understand and feel a connection with each of them.

On Textbooks

Although it is traditional for college students to complain about the number (and cost) of textbooks, and I sometimes did so too, I actually felt a certain special pleasure when buying assigned books for my classes. Seeing the lovely pile of books with their varied topics, sizes, and colors, I had a sense of anticipation. I knew that I would read my way through those books as the semester progressed, and by the end of the term, I would know so much more about the world. This feeling came from the same place where all my feelings about books come from: the overwhelming conviction that books are central to my life, and that they provide knowledge, power, variety, connection, and pleasure. Twentieth century American fiction! Survey of European art! Introduction to Social Psychology! The Novels of Joseph Conrad! Hinduism! Existentialism! It has been many many years since I was a college student, but as a professor, I still feel a little frisson when I walk into a university bookstore at the beginning of a new semester and see all those beautiful books, classified by department and class number, filling the shelves.

"Normal"

On 2/27/10, I wrote to highly recommend Amy Bloom's latest short story collection, "Where the God of Love Hangs Out." I was intrigued to discover that in addition to writing short stories and novels, she had written a nonfiction book titled "Normal: Transsexual CEOs, Crossdressing Cops, and Hermaphrodites with Attitude" (Random House, 2002), so I found and read it. Bloom had been wondering about the definition of "normal" regarding questions of gender and sexuality, so she researched three groups of people, as the title indicates: female-to-male transsexuals, male cross-dressers, and the intersexed. She spoke with doctors and scientists, as well as with people in each of the three categories, including activists, people who are open about their differences, and those who hide them. For example, she went on a cruise with a group of male cross-dressers and their wives, and describes them in perceptive detail. Bloom writes of the great variety, the great continuum, of what is "normal." She states that nature is "vast, capricious, occasionally hilarious, and infinitely varied." Even within each of the three groups she writes about, there is enormous diversity. At the same time, she shows us the ordinariness and humanity of people who happen to be different from the majority in particular sexual or gender traits. Besides Bloom's message of understanding, the best part of the book is her portraits of specific individuals whom she has gotten to know and with whom she has made a very human connection. The stories she tells are alternately serious, humorous, and heartbreaking; of of them are fascinating.

Canadian Writers

Because I was born in Canada of Canadian parents, and although I grew up in India and have lived my adult life in the United States, I still feel a close connection to, and pride in, Canada. I am particularly proud of the great Canadian writers who have international reputations. I discovered some of these authors during my college days, in a wonderful class on Canadian literature taught by the great Canadian poet A.J.M. Smith, and discovered others on my own throughout the years. Below is a list of a few prominent Canadian writers, some from the past and some currently writing, whose work I have read and liked, along with brief comments, as well as the titles of one or more of their best-known works. I will likely write in more detail about some of these authors and books individually in future posts.

-Margaret Atwood. Novelist, poet, critic, and political/social commentator. She and Munro are the most famous Canadian writers currently writing. Surfacing; Cat's Eye; The Handmaid's Tale.
-Robertson Davies. He and Richler were the most famous Canadian authors until Atwood and Munro came along. The Deptford Trilogy.
-Mavis Gallant. Gallant published over a hundred stories in The New Yorker. The Collected Stories; Paris Stories.
-Margaret Laurence. The Stone Angel.
-Malcolm Lowry. Under the Volcano.
-Anne-Marie Macdonald. Fall on Your Knees.
-Rohinton Mistry. Mistry is also on my list of writers of Indian heritage (3/1/10). A Fine Balance. Family Matters.
-L.M. Montgomery. Revered by young female readers around the world. I adored her books as a child, and loved reading them to and with my daughter later. It happens that I am also distantly related to Montgomery; her stories take place on Prince Edward Island, where my grandfather grew up. Anne of Green Gables and its sequels.
-Alice Munro. Considered by many to be the leading living short story writer in the world. Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage: Stories (a collection from several earlier volumes); Too Much Happiness (her latest collection).
-Michael Ondaatje. The English Patient. Anil's Ghost.
-Mordecai Richler. The great Montreal writer. The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz.
-Carol Shields. I have already posted about Shields (2/20/10), a great favorite of mine. The Stone Diaries; Larry's Party; Unless.

"Old Filth"; "The Man in the Wooden Hat"

Jane Gardam, the terrific English writer, has only recently been "discovered" in the United States, precipitated by the publication of her two most recent novels, "Old Filth" (Europa, 2006) and "The Man in the Wooden Hat" (Europa, 2009). These two novels are complementary; the first focuses on a husband and the second on his wife. We hear the same story from their two different viewpoints; each novel reveals new information. Sir Edward Feathers, nicknamed "Filth" for "Failed in London, try Hong Kong," has made his way in the still colonial Hong Kong of the post-World War II years, eventually rising to the position of a successful judge who is knighted, and retiring to the Dorset countryside at the end of his long career. He is an example of the effects of the British Empire on its children, having had a sad, almost parentless childhood in Malaysia and then Wales. Although he is somewhat emotionally stunted by this childhood, and has great trouble communicating his feelings, Gardam also shows his essential decency and humanity. His wife, Betty, has a very difficult childhood as well, having been starved in a Japanese internment camp in Shanghai during the war. This couple, each somewhat at sea in life, and needing some stability and human connection, stumbles into marriage. Gardam's depiction of their long, complicated marriage of almost 50 years is a masterpiece, as she portrays its constantly shifting landscape of happiness, unhappiness, secrets, and compromises. Jane Gardam is an astonishingly good writer; as soon as you begin reading either of these novels (and I strongly recommend you read both), you know you are in the hands of a master who is in complete control of her material. She has been called "mordantly funny" and"acerbic," both true, but she also shows us the underlying humanity of her characters, in all their complexity. So I recommend these books for their insider portrayal of British colonialism (a topic that has fascinated me since my childhood in India), for their startlingly original yet recognizable characters, and for the portrayal of Filth's and Betty's marriage. I also recommend Gardam's other novels; some that I have relished (and they are so good that you do "relish" them!) include "The People on Privilege Hill," "The Flight of the Maidens," and "The Queen of the Tambourine."

On Vacation Reading

Whether it be in a city, by a lake or ocean, or in the mountains, I have a few basic requirements for good vacation trips: beautiful locales, comfortable accommodations (no camping or roughing it for me!), and -- perhaps most critical -- an abundant provision of carefully selected books. There must be more than enough, more than I can possibly read, to ensure against the unthinkable disaster of running out of good reading material. When my parents had a lakeside summer cottage in Michigan for many years, I would spend two or three weeks there every summer. In the weeks before I (or we) left California for Michigan, I would carefully browse bookstores and accumulate a hefty stack of suitable books. Although for my regular reading, I often check out books from libraries, for vacations I prefer my own paperback books that I can read by a lake or pool without worrying about getting them wet, and that I can leave behind for others to read. The selection of vacation books has to be carefully calibrated. I don't generally want anything too "heavy," but I also don't want the proverbial "beach books" that are just too predictable and badly written. But there is a wide middle ground of wonderful novels, short story collections, and memoirs, and this is where I focus my selections. Going to Michigan (or anywhere I needed or need to fly), there was the delicious and slightly anxious decision about how many books to take onboard; I had to calculate how much I would read during the several hours flying out east. And, finally, there was the bliss of unpacking that pile of books at the cottage, stacking them on a dresser or bedside table, and knowing I could relax, enjoy the camaraderie of family, and sit on a deck chair by the gorgeous lake with a book in my hand and the prospect of more to come....what could be better?

"One Amazing Thing"

If you are a regular reader of this blog, you might be surprised to see that I am discussing this novel, as it was one of the books listed in my 3/5/10 post titled "On 'Perfectly Fine' Books" as not outstanding enough for me to highly recommend. However, my friend Mary asked that I consider writing about books I had recently read that I had mixed feelings about, explaining what I liked and didn't like about them. It was a good suggestion, so I will occasionally do that, starting today with "One Amazing thing" (Voice, 2010), a novel by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni. I have read several of this author's novels, and generally enjoy them. The story in this one involves a diverse group of nine people trapped in the Indian consulate in an unnamed city (but seemingly San Francisco) by an earthquake. As they wait, hoping to be rescued, they decide that each person will tell a story about "one amazing thing" that has happened to her or him, along the lines of "Canterbury Tales," the book that one of the characters has been reading. The individual stories are compelling, even wrenching. And there are some intriguing and touching interactions among the characters. But the overall story is a bit pat, a bit too schematic, a bit too dependent on the artificial structure of the stitched-together stories. Some of the characters are shadowy and inadequately developed. The book is quite readable and will keep your attention, but finally, despite the gravity of the characters' situation, this novel seems to me rather lightweight and forgettable.

Diana Athill

A few days ago, I was very pleased to hear that Diana Athill's book "Somewhere Towards the End" (Granta, 2008) had just won the National Book Critics Circle Award for autobiography. Athill, who is English and a longtime literary editor, is now 92 years old. We are rarely given the gift of the viewpoint of someone of her years on what it is like to be aging, and more important, on what it is like to be alive and thriving at an advanced age. She said in an interview in the Guardian (1/5/09), "I think the fact that I'm in my 90s and still compos mentis, and able to write and have a nice time, is encouraging to people." I'm sure this is true; in addition, though, people read her work, and give her awards for it, because she is such a good writer. As her editor at Granta, Ian Jack, said, reading her is "like having someone speak into your ear, someone humane and self-amused and wise" (Guardian, 10/31/09). This book about her old age is her sixth memoir; the most well-known three were written in the author's 80s. In addition to "Somewhere Towards the End," they are "Stet: A Memoir" (Granta, 2000) about her long career as an editor, but also including much about her personal life, and "Yesterday Morning: A Very English Childhood" (Granta, 2002), whose title is self-explanatory. In all three memoirs (and these are the three that I have read; I plan to seek out the earlier ones as well), Athill is remarkably and straightforwardly candid, including about her love life and affairs. She is also quite modest about her talents, despite being a leading editor and then consultant with the publisher Andre Deutsch for over 40 years, and working with such esteemed writers as Simone de Beauvoir, V. S. Naipaul, Jean Rhys, Margaret Atwood, John Updike, Norman Mailer, and Philip Roth. Happily for us, Athill is still writing, and is now, at 92, achieving the greatest success and renown of her life thus far.

The Threepenny Review

The Threepenny Review is a wonderful quarterly publication on literature and the arts that is edited and published by Wendy Lesser in Berkeley. Besides insightful book reviews, it publishes essays on music, art, architecture, and all the arts; it also includes poetry, fiction, memoirs, and photographs. Two characteristics of the Threepenny Review always strike me, every single issue. First, there is a sense of abundance and generosity. Whole pages are devoted to poetry; photographs are plentiful and large, with enough space around them to allow us to truly appreciate them. Second, most of the writing has the piquancy of originality, sometimes quirkiness, often surprise. For example, the Fall 2009 issue includes "A Symposium on the Piano," in which various writers comment on the topic from various angles (the piano as furniture, the piano as art, the piano as it influenced Kandinsky and other artists, the question of how pianos should reproduce Baroque music, and a riff on various types of pianos by the jazz pianist Ethan Iverson). The same issue includes multiple photographs by Ben Shahn throughout its pages; as the photography note points out, Shahn - the painter, muralist, and printmaker - "is probably least known for his photographs" (p. 7), so this issue gives us a different view of an artist we have known in a different way. The Threepenny Review is informative, enjoyable, and even exciting to read; I feel a sense of discovery when I read each new issue. As a bonus, subscriptions are inexpensive.

Two Recent Essay Collections

In recent years I have found myself reading more essays than in the past. I highly recommend two recent collections of essays. The well-regarded novelist Michael Chabon's "Manhood for Amateurs: The Pleasures and Regrets of a Husband, Father, and Son" (Harper, 2009) includes engaging pieces on the author's own childhood, his marriage, his children, and much more. Although I was a bit wary of the book, just as I am of all the attention men often receive if they do parenting tasks that women have always done without special acclaim, I was won over by Chabon's honesty, modesty, originality, and beautiful writing. As an aside: Chabon and his wife, the writer Ayelet Waldman, are active in the literary community here in the San Francisco Bay Area (they live in Berkeley); for example, I saw Chabon interview the political cartoonist Garry Trudeau at the Herbst Theater in San Francisco, and I briefly met Waldman at an event at one of my favorite bookstores, Book Passage in Corte Madera.

The English writer Zadie Smith, also a well-known novelist (whose novels include "White Teeth" and "On Beauty," both wonderful) has a new book, "Changing My Mind: Occasional Essays" (Penguin, 2009) that includes essays on books, movies, politics, and family; it ends with a touching tribute to her father. The writing is thoughtful, personal, and often illuminating, and is written in a direct, almost conversational tone. The pieces I particularly like include those on E. M. Forster, George Eliot, and other writers who have influenced Smith's own writing. (Her novel "On Beauty" is loosely based on the structure and story of E. M. Forster's masterpiece, "Howards End," one of my all-time favorite novels.)

"The Uncommon Reader," by Alan Bennett

A small (120 pages), very witty and funny book that I have recently pressed on friends is Alan Bennett's "The Uncommon Reader" (Farrar,Straus, & Giroux, 2007). When I first read reviews of the book, and for some time after, I resisted reading it, as it sounded too gimmicky, too "cutesy." However, when I finally gave in and read it, I loved it. Its humorous, tongue in cheek premise is that the Queen of England suddenly -- through her unlikely accidental friendship with a lowly but well-read palace cook's assistant named Norman -- discovers the pleasures of reading. She becomes completely besotted with books, devouring classics, contemporary novels, memoirs, and more, to the surprise and sometimes barely stifled displeasure of some around her. She is unfazed by controversial themes, salty language, or risque illustrations, taking it all in imperturbable stride. The only thing that bothers her is that she didn't start reading sooner. Along the way, she airily or acerbically tosses off deadpan amusing comments about books. For example, on being asked by members of her public if she has read the Harry Potter books (she doesn't like fantasy), she "invariably said briskly 'One is saving that for a rainy day' and passed swiftly on" (p. 43). And while reading Henry James, she comments aloud, "Oh, do get on" (p. 49) (but doesn't stop reading!). This is a lovely book, a real treat for readers who love books about books, and an extra treat for those of us who love all things English.

Restaurant and Tour Guidebooks

One of my bookshelves is lined with small, thin, colorful books whose titles begin with "Zagat," "Michelin," "Frommer's," or "Lonely Planet." Although these are not the kinds of books we generally read cover to cover, they are extremely useful. I don't rely on any one of them completely, and always "cross-check" with other sources, but they are very valuable in providing ideas and information when we want to eat at restaurants, or when we are planning trips. I often annotate the pages of these books after a trip or a restaurant outing, so they become records and souvenirs for later. And there is another dimension to these books, beyond their practical uses: they provide us with material for daydreaming. Leafing through a guidebook, savoring the photographs of castles and cathedrals and museums and green hills, or deciphering the maps, I either remember former travels, or imagine and hope for future voyages. I make itineraries in my head; I picture myself in various settings. Or with the restaurant guides, I imagine going to charming Michelin-starred restaurants in little towns in France or Spain, or the latest fashionable eating places in bustling cities all over the world. What these little guidebooks have in common with all good books is that they open up our worlds, they let us live in realms where everything seems delightfully and deliciously possible.

Reader's Digest Condensed books

Readers of this blog may well be surprised to see the title above. I am guessing that you, like me, firmly believe that books should be read unabridged; abridging books seems unnatural, almost like mutilating them. But I have to admit that when I was a child and young teenager, I sometimes liked reading Reader's Digest Condensed books. What an odd medley of books (mostly novels) each volume contained! Each included about five books, five tastes of five different worlds. Opening up a new volume, one never knew what one might find. Reading these condensed versions allowed me to read many books I probably wouldn't have read otherwise, especially when we lived in India and didn't have easy access to libraries with books in English. Sometimes these volumes introduced me to new authors, and I would later seek out and read other (unabridged) novels by those authors. So, although I haven't read any of them for decades, I find I have affectionate memories of those solid, uniformly gold-trimmed volumes that looked so impressive sitting in a row on a bookshelf, each containing such surprising mixtures of reading experiences.

The Upstart Crow: A Pioneering Bookstore

Yesterday I wrote to recommend Lewis Buzbee's book, "The Yellow-Lighted Bookshop." In that book, Buzbee writes about the first bookstore where he worked many years ago, in San Jose, California. When I saw the bookstore's name, I gave a start of recognition; it brought back memories from 30 years ago. Soon after I moved to San Francisco from Michigan, my parents moved to Fresno, California, also from Michigan. On one of my first visits to Fresno, they took me to a bookstore they had discovered there, one that included a cafe, of all things: Upstart Crow! It was a member of a small chain of bookstores. (The source of the name, according to Buzbee, was an envious contemporary of Shakespeare, who scornfully dubbed him an "upstart crow"). As Buzbee tells it, "Decades ahead of other book retailers," Upstart Crow created bookstores with "foreign periodicals, chessboards, plenty of big tables and comfy chairs" and a cafe. Now, of course, all of these features are old hat, but at the time we were amazed and impressed by the combination of a bookstore and a cafe: What a very clever idea!

A Must-Read for Bookstore Lovers

Please put "The Yellow-Lighted Bookshop: A Memoir, A History" (Graywolf Press, 2006), by Lewis Buzbee, on your to-read list! I recently came across this book when I was chatting with a bookseller at The Depot, an independent bookstore near where I live in Marin County; when I told her how much I loved bookstores, she pressed this book on me and told me I absolutely had to read it. She was right! Buzbee writes vividly and engagingly of his lifelong love affair with books and bookstores. He worked in bookstores and later as a book sales representative for many years, and is a published fiction writer himself, so he knows this world very well. As the title suggests, the book includes Buzbee's own very well-told stories, interleaved with (just enough, not too much) historical background about books and bookstores. For me, the book's interest is enhanced even further by the fact that Buzbee lives in San Francisco, and writes about bookstores that I know as well. And, coincidentally, I found out after I finished the book that he teaches creative writing at the university where I teach too. "The Yellow-Lighted Bookshop" begins as follows: "When I walk into a bookstore, any bookstore...I am flooded with a sense of hushed excitement." How could you not want to continue reading?

On NOT Reading "Wolf Hall"

I've decided NOT to read the novel "Wolf Hall" (Henry Holt, 2009), by Hilary Mantel. Yes, it is about an important and interesting topic (the time of, and interactions among, Henry VIII, Thomas Cromwell, Thomas More, and Anne Boleyn). Yes, it is by an esteemed, award-winning author. Yes, it has been well-reviewed. Yes, it is one of the "big" and important books of the past year. And yes, it is a bestseller (the latter not necessarily a point in its favor!). I put it on my request list at the library. But when I got the message that it was ready for me to pick up, a curious unwillingness came over me. "Do I really have to read this?" I asked myself. And soon found myself -- with a sense of relief -- giving myself permission not to read it. I hate to admit it, but it was partly because the novel was so dauntingly long (560 pages). But that doesn't stop me when I really want to read a book. Maybe it was because I don't generally read a lot of historical fiction. Or maybe because this is a topic I have often read about before. In any case, the commitment was too much for what I anticipated the rewards to be. I am sure it is a wonderful novel, and I do not want to discourage others from reading it...not at all. But it won't be on the pile on my bedside table.

"Kafka's Soup"

"Kafka's Soup: A Complete History of World Literature in 14 Recipes" (Harcourt, 2005), written and illustrated by Mark Crick, is a lovely little souffle of a book for those of us who love both literature and food. Each recipe is written in the style of a different author. The recipes include "Tarragon Eggs a la Jane Austen"; "Tiramisu a la Marcel Proust"; "Clafoutis Grandmere a la Virginia Woolf"; and "Onion Tart a la Geoffrey Chaucer." Each "recipe" is really a miniature (about three pages long) story. Let me quote from the Virginia Woolf recipe: "She placed the cherries in a buttered dish and looked out of the window...the cherries...would not be pitted, red polka dots on white, so bright and jolly, their little core of hardness invisible...Gently she melted the butter, transparent and smooth, oleaginous and clear, clarified and golden...Should she have made something traditionally English? (Involuntarily, piles of cake rose before her eyes.)...With great serenity she added an egg...whose yellow sphere, falling into the domed bowl, broke and poured, like Vesuvius erupting into the mixture, like the sun setting into a butter sea." This is a small, airy, light, whimsical and witty book, and I promise that you will smile when you read it.

On "Perfectly Fine" Books

Since I read so much, you might wonder why I don't more often post recommendations of specific books I have just read. The answer is that I only want to recommend books that I am really excited about, and are especially well written, or perhaps intriguing for some other reason. The truth is that although I read reviews before I select books, I still read a lot of books that -- in my humble opinion -- are either not particularly good, or -- more often -- are fine but not exceptional. After all, by definition, outstanding books can only be so against the background of all the "OK" or "perfectly fine" books. Also, of course deciding which books are outstanding is at least partially subjective; some of the examples I list below have been well reviewed. I fully admit that my opinions are only my own, and are perhaps sometimes idiosyncratic. And I often enjoy and learn from these "less than outstanding" books; I am not sorry that I have read them. Today's post is a recognition of books that -- for me -- fall into the "absolutely fine, even quite good, but nothing to post a glowing blog entry about" category. Some such books that I have read in the past few weeks are Louise Erdrich's "Shadow Tag"; Ursula Hegi's "The Worst Thing I Have Done"; Jonathan Tropper's "This Is Where I Leave You"; Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni's "One Amazing Thing"; and Marisha Chamberlain's "The Rose Variations." Now you know why I haven't posted about any of these.

The New Yorker and I

What would we do without the New Yorker? When my copy arrives every week, with its beautiful cover, I know I have a treat in store. The magazine is a source of truly good prose on so many topics: politics, art, current events, and much more. Often its compelling prose draws me into reading about a topic I didn't even know I was interested in until I began the article. One of the magazine's great contributions is that it has always published, and still publishes, fiction, at a time when many other mainstream magazines have stopped doing so. I know that some feel that the stories published by the New Yorker are too much alike, all in "the New Yorker style." I disagree, and am most grateful for the magazine.

I can't resist adding a New Yorker-related personal note here. A photograph of my daughter and me appeared in the May 17, 1999 issue. Why was that, you may well ask! It came about because my friend B, a professional, gifted, and well-exhibited photographer who specializes in photographing people in their homes, had in 1995 taken a posed picture of my young daughter doing a dance pose on our dining room table, with me sitting nearby, my face obscured by the newspaper I was reading. This photograph was in her portfolio and was chosen by the New Yorker to accompany a short story titled "How Was It, Really?" by the late great John Updike. I was happy for B. that her photograph was published in such a venue; I must say I was also tickled that my daughter and I had even this small connection with a writer whose work has given me much pleasure over the years.

Author Interviews and Readings "Live"

Yesterday I wrote about the serendipitous pleasure of turning on one's radio and hearing Fresh Air's Terry Gross interview an author. A related and even greater pleasure, albeit one that takes more planning, time, and - sometimes - money, is hearing a favorite author interviewed in person. Here in San Francisco, for example, we are fortunate to have the City Arts and Lectures series, which is held in the small, ornate Herbst Theater in the Civic Center. Authors (and others) are interviewed for abut 45 minutes by a sometimes equally well-known local luminary. They sit on a bare stage and talk, and usually read excerpts from their work; afterward, there is time for questions and comments from the audience. We in the audience sit quite close to the stage (there are no bad or faraway seats) listening; we can almost imagine we are participating in one of the fabled literary salons of yore. A couple of years ago, within the space of a few weeks, I had the privilege and pleasure of seeing and hearing Amy Tan, Sandra Cisneros, and Jhumpa Lahiri speak and read in this series. Soon after, I was able to hear the great poet Sharon Olds read her work at another San Francisco venue. For those who cannot attend "live," the City Arts and Lectures events are broadcast on a local public radio station (KQED-FM) a few weeks later. Besides attending such series as City Arts and Lectures, readers can find many author appearances at local bookstores.

Author Interviews on Fresh Air

What a lovely, serendipitous gift it is when one is driving, turns on the radio, and hears the voice of a favorite writer! When this happens, it is highly likely that she program in question is NPR's Fresh Air, with its interviews by the wonderful Terry Gross. Gross also interviews musicians, artists, filmmakers, actors, and other intriguing people. But the greatest pleasure for me is her conversations with authors. Although I do not listen to the program regularly, I have -- with great delight -- stumbled upon interviews with Jhumpa Lahiri, John Updike, Joyce Carol Oates, Jane Smiley, and several other writers. A year or two ago I ran across Gross' published collection of her interviews with 39 people in the arts, "All I Did Was Ask" (Hyperion, 2004). The interview subjects included Eric Clapton, Jodie Foster, Chris Rock, Sonny Rollins, Chuck Close, and Dustin Hoffman, among other artists, musicians, and actors; all were fascinating interviews. But best of all, of course, were the interviews with authors John Updike, James Baldwin, Mary Karr, Andre Dubus, Nick Hornby, Maurice Sendak, and Carol Shields. For those of you who don't already know Fresh Air and Terry Gross, I highly recommend both the radio show and the book.

Indian Writers Who Write in English

Because I grew up in India, and because I am interested in fiction about various cultures in contact with each other, I have sought out and read many novels by Indian writers writing in English. Starting in about the early 1980s, there was an increasing number of such novels being published. Some of these writers live in and write about India itself; more of them, the ones being published in the West, have either grown up in or moved to the United States, Canada, or the UK; many of their novels are about the experience of being immigrants, of being pulled between two cultures. By the end of the 20th century, fiction by Indian authors seemed ubiquitous, and was very well received and reviewed. Salman Rushdie and others have decried the fact that literature in other, indigenous (i.e., non-English) languages of India is rarely translated and still more rarely published outside of India. Similar concerns have been expressed by African writers. I understand this concern, and hope that more such fiction will be translated and published. In the meanwhile, though, I celebrate the wealth of Indian fiction that we readers have access to. Below I list some of the Indian authors whose work I have particularly enjoyed, and whom I particularly respect. Some of these authors have published numerous novels and short story collections; here I include one or two titles for each authors as samples.

Samina Ali - Madras on Rainy Days
Anita Desai - Fire on the Mountain
Kiran Desai - The Inheritance of Loss
Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni - the Mistress of Spices; Queen of Dreams
Tania James - Atlas of Unknowns
Ginu Kamani - Junglee Girl
Jhumpa Lahiri - The Namesake
Kamala Markandaya - Nectar in a Sieve
Gita Mehta - A River Sutra
Rohinton Mistry - Family Matters; A Fine Balance
Bharati Mukherjee - Jasmine; Desirable Daughters
Arundhati Roy - The God of Small Things
Salman Rushdie - Midnight's Children
Nayantara Sahgal - Rich Like Us
Manil Suri - The Death of Vishnu