"Old Age: A Beginner's Guide," by Michael Kinsley

Michael Kinsley, a longtime journalist/writer and editor of and for various prestigious periodicals (The New Republic, Harper’s, Slate, etc.), was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease (“PD”) in his forties. For a while, he did not reveal this condition, fearing he would be pitied and perhaps not be considered for jobs, but eventually decided to do so. He has now lived with PD for about twenty years, and has been helped by medicine and surgery to live a relatively healthy and certainly very productive life. In his short book, “Old Age: A Beginner’s Guide” (Tim Duggan Books, 2016), a compendium of essays that form a coherent book, he writes candidly about his PD. Part of his purpose here is to educate readers and to demystify the disease. But his larger topic is how the Boomers generation is now learning about and confronting aging and, inevitably, death. The book is a combination of memoir, philosophical musings, story telling, medical information, advice, and more. Kinsley’s style is accessible, humane, occasionally a bit humorous, and realistic.

"Sweetbitter," by Stephanie Danler

I realize that I often write about the settings of novels, and that I generally prefer these to be small spaces: a village, a vacation town, a college, or even a house. As Jane Austen said about her own writing, “Three or four families in a country village is the very thing,” the setting that allows a concentration of human characteristics and behavior to be observed in detail. After reading the novel “Sweetbitter” (Knopf, 2016), I realized how its intense focus on one place, a prominent New York City restaurant, and to a much lesser extent its surroundings, allowed the author, Stephanie Danler, her close observations of this small universe of its own. The restaurant, apparently based on the famed Union Square Café, where I have read that Danler herself worked at one point, provides the main character, Tess, the new world she is looking for when she leaves her small town life and flees to New York. This specific, concentrated world is very difficult for an employee to enter, and requires months or years of training and acclimatization, and Tess struggles to learn how it all works and how she can do well at it, yet from the beginning takes to and loves the place, the people, the experience. The novel contains much information about how a high-end restaurant works, about food and wine and service, but also about the tight yet ephemeral society created by the employees. Drugs and alcohol and sex are ever present. But so is dedication to service. Tess takes it upon herself to learn everything she can about wine and food, with the help of her mentor Simone and her crush and eventual lover Jake. But not all is what it seems, and there is both great joy and great betrayal. I thought I would be writing about this novel mainly as yet another example of the tsunami of restaurant books, mostly memoirs, that have been published the past few years, many of which I have read and enjoyed. But strangely, when I started writing about “Sweetbitter” here, I realized that the restaurant part, although fascinating, especially to those of us who love good restaurants and who dine out fairly often, was not even the main point. True, readers can learn much about restaurants and fine dining when reading this novel, but we learn more about youth, ambition, the great attraction of the big city of New York to young people all over the United States, and the way that each (especially young) person has to learn for herself or himself the age-old lessons of how the world works.

"The Children," by Ann Leary

“The Children” (St. Martin’s, 2016), by Ann Leary, combines two elements of one of the types of novels I enthusiastically lean toward: a focus on a family and their various relationships with each other and with other people in their circle(s), and a family home that is the setting for most of the action. This novel also includes, unexpectedly to the reader until at least halfway through, elements of a psychological thriller, and a surprise ending (although of course there are clues). Leary is the author of the bestselling “The Good House” of a few years ago (see my post of 2/11/13), a novel that also focused on characters in the confined setting of a house in a small town. In the case of “The Children” the town is called “Lakeside,” in Connecticut. The family in question is a blended one; the main resident of the home, Joan, married the owner, the late Whit, and both brought small children to the marriage. Now the children are grown, but both their love and resentments from the past are resurfacing, and the resulting fissures, aggravated by the both charismatic and jarring presence of the love interest of one of the (step)siblings, form the spine of the plot. Other complications include psychological issues in at least two of the siblings. Interesting subplots/themes include music (Whit was a banjo maker and his children are musical) and Internet/blogging activities (one of the characters has a parenting blog, although she is not a parent, and there are various musings about the power of the Internet). All these elements combine for a compelling novel, and I couldn’t stop reading it. Yet when it ended, it left me let down and with a bit of a sour taste in my mouth. Why? Maybe the fairly sudden switch to thriller mode? Maybe the characters just didn’t reach out and make me care abut them? Or maybe something else I can’t put my finger on. I am, once again, reminded of the unpredictability of readers' feelings toward a book. A few works are unquestionably masterful (oh how I wish there were a female or neutral substitute for this word, and for “masterpiece”!); some I like for my own reasons and because of my own tastes; some I don’t particularly like but I can see why others do, again a matter of taste; and some seem unquestionably subpar. But except for the clear occupants of both ends of the scale (and even these can change with the passing of time and changes in critical judgments), these are to some extent -- aside from fairly obvious divisions along the scale -- matters of judgment, taste, and personal preference.

"Love and Friendship," the Movie

If you love Jane Austen’s work, as you know I do, I recommend you see the new movie “Love and Friendship.” It is based on Austen’s early, unfinished book, “Lady Susan.” (This is a little confusing, because Austen’s first published juvenilia was a novella titled “Love and Freindship,” and yes, the misspelling was in the original title.) I have read the book several times (although fewer times than Austen's complete novels; it is Austen, so I love it, but it is clearly not at the level of her six finished novels), and just saw the film and liked it very much. It (the book and the film) is a bit darker (not too dark though) than most of her work, and than the other movies based on her work. Both still have the wit, the comedy, the razor-sharp observations of Austen’s work. What is different is that the main character, Lady Susan Vernon, is truly unscrupulous and manipulative, more than most of Austen’s characters in her other novels, especially women characters (there are a few deceiving rakes in the other novels, but even they are usually repentant at some point, and/or have some redeeming qualities). But even so, we see that as a female on her own, a widow with few financial resources, Lady Susan has to use whatever she can to survive (one of Austen's messages in some of her other novels, but usually in less blatant form). She has her own agency, and is able to achieve her goals (eventually) of marrying off her daughter and then getting married herself, flirting and having affairs with others, always playing one man off against another. The acting is excellent, with Kate Beckinsale in the part of Lady Susan, and other wonderful actors, some recognizable (Stephen Frye, Jemma Redgrave), some not. As a bonus, the beautiful costumes and the settings of the impressive country houses are splendid.

"The Pursuit of Love" and "Love in a Cold Climate," by Nancy Mitford

While reading a review of yet another book (at least two or three of which I have read) about the famous Mitford family, I saw mention of “The Pursuit of Love” and “Love in a Cold Climate” (originally 1945 and 1949, but available in many editions since then) as Nancy Mitford’s best novels. I was reminded of how much I have enjoyed her several novels over the years, and feeling in need of something light, humorous, and very British, I re-read these two interlocking (although each can stand on its own as well) novels (each of which I have read a couple of times before, but not recently) and enjoyed them thoroughly. Readers probably know the background of the Mitford family, but just as a quick refresher: The family of six sisters and one brother were part of the British upper class, raised during the period between World Wars I and II in a huge house in the country with little education (for the girls) but much exposure to books and educated people. They developed their own little society with secrets, inside jokes, special languages, and general hilarity. What makes them noteworthy is that Nancy became a bestselling novelist; Jessica became a famous Communist and muckraking writer (“The American Way of Death”) in the United States; Diana and Unity, in stark contrast, became Fascists and were involved with Hitler; only Pamela and Deborah led quieter, more conventional lives. These two novels are, in slightly disguised form, about the girls during their childhoods, and into their early adulthoods, but focus by far the most on Nancy herself (“Linda” in the novels). Political differences, or even politics at all, are rarely discussed; they would definitely not fit with the mostly lighthearted (although with some personal sadnesses) stories in these novels. A cousin “Fanny” is invented to serve as an involved observer and narrator who has spent much of her childhood with the Mitfords (the “Radletts” in the novels). “The Pursuit of Love” focuses on the childhood years, and then jumps to the girls’ young adulthood years. “Love in a Cold Climate” has most of the same characters, but focuses largely on a grand neighboring family, the Hamptons. Again, Fanny serves as the main observer and narrator. The plots of the novels are both too complicated and too light (although at times turning quite serious) to summarize here. Suffice it to say that they are mainly about family life, outsized characters, the relationships of the “girls” with each other, their parents, their neighbors, and their various suitors. The books are beautifully written (writing in this style is much harder than it looks), very entertaining and funny, if you like this genre of British domestic comedy of the early-to-mid twentieth century, and I do, very much. But it is not everyone’s cup of tea. (Sorry, I couldn’t resist!) Another issue is that the books are sometimes quite blatantly un-PC, and certain storylines definitely jar on our twenty-first century sensibilities. I, although I concede to no one in my PC-ness, thank you very much, am willing to give the novels partial passes in view of the time period when the events happened and when the novels were written.

"The Swans of Fifth Avenue," by Melanie Benjamin

WHY did I read “The Swans of Fifth Avenue” (Delacorte, 2016), by Melanie Benjamin? Well, I know why: it has a literary aspect, in that it tells the story of the well-known author Truman Capote’s betraying the confidences of his society women friends (Babe Paley, Gloria Guinness, Pamela Churchill, etc.) (dubbed "the swans") when he wrote about them, in thinly disguised form, in “La Cote Basque 1965,” the first installment of a planned (but never finished) novel “Answered Prayers.” This was a major literary and social scandal at the time (1975). Of course the New York City aspect also attracted me. But why did I think I would learn anything new, or that reading about this old scandal would be enjoyable? Yes, this novel about a real-life situation is fun in a sort of catty way, with bits of insight and occasionally thoughtful portrayals of both Capote and his friends, as well as of the “high society” of the times. And of course there is some juicy (but old) gossip. But mostly it just doesn’t live up to the potential of its topic or its real-life characters. OK, I did keep reading, and I did finish the novel. But I closed the book with the question I started this entry with: WHY did I read it?

"Everybody's Fool," by Richard Russo

I really, really don’t want to essentialize gender roles. But sometimes, for reasons of either nature or nurture, or some combination thereof, there do seem to be differences between men and women, and also in the ways that male writers and female writers portray life and the universe. And these differences are an element in the reasons I read far more fiction by female writers than males. There is a tendency for women to write more about characters and relationships, it seems, and those are among the most important qualities to me when reading novels and short stories. Obviously these statements of mine are broad generalizations, and there are many exceptions. There is probably some kind of Venn Diagram somewhere portraying the overlap, when the work of individual writers of each gender (not forgetting those who do not fit into this binary) is analyzed and classified. Which leads me to the work of Richard Russo, and specifically to his new novel, “Everybody’s Fool” (Knopf, 2016), which I have just read with great enjoyment and a bit of awe at what an amazing writer he is. In this novel (and in some but not all of his others, several of which I have read and which I highly recommend), he writes mostly about male characters, mostly of the working class, and there is a lot of male-type action (if I am allowed this shorthand, appended to which readers will please assume all the usual caveats and hedges), such as heavy drinking in dive bars, fights and brawling, guns, criminal behavior (mostly petty, but not all), crazy stunts, and “guy talk” about the bodies of women. Those are all elements that I usually am not very interested in. But Russo makes these characters come alive, with all their complicated qualities, and makes me care about them. “Everybody’s Fool” is a sort of sequel to “Nobody’s Fool,” taking place about ten years after the events of that novel. The main character in the original novel, Sully, is a complicated, ornery, tough, confused, devil-may-care, seemingly aimless guy (played, incidentally, by my longtime favorite actor, Paul Newman, in the movie version of that novel). Sully is a main character in this current novel as well, but other main characters step up, including a minor character from the first novel, Doug Raymer, now in a much more prominent role as the somewhat hapless police chief of the small, hapless upstate New York town of Bath. Other male characters such as the mayor, Gus Moynihan, and a failing developer, Carl Roebuck, are in equal parts swaggering and overwhelmed by life. The fewer women characters generally don’t fare better, and mostly serve as foils for the men. One wife and one ex-wife are mentally and emotionally ill. Only one female character, Chief Raymer’s assistant, Charice, is (mostly) confident, healthy, independent, and strong, and even she often prioritizes her commitment to help her emotionally crippled brother Jerome over her own needs and desires. But I don't want to leave the impression that Russo slights women characters, or that they are one-dimensional; neither characterization is true. Mostly, all the characters, male or female, just muddle along. There are many robust plot points in "Everybody's Fool," some comedic and some tragic, and most some combination of the two. The novel's characters are all caught in an environment of failure, in a town that progress has passed by, yet its inhabitants find ways to get by. After all, Bath is home, and those co-inhabiting the town are -- whether loved, loathed, or simply tolerated -- family members, ex-spouses, friends, former classmates, drinking buddies, and former and present love interests. Despite some rivalries and resentments of past slights and fallings-out, there are many moments of humanity, of mutual support, of good intentions, and of insights hard won. Russo never, ever condescends to his characters, but he also is not afraid to show their foibles and limitations. All this is a long way of saying that I believe Russo’s fiction combines the best of “men’s fiction” (otherwise known by some as “mainstream literary fiction”) and “women’s fiction,” and the result is rich, funny, sad, entertaining, uplifting but not in a sappy way, and just plain bursting with humanity. During the time period when I was reading this novel, I happened to stumble on -- with great delight -- Russo being interviewed on the radio, on "Fresh Air," by the terrific Terry Gross (about whom I have written here as well), and he sounded like a man I would love to know in person: a classic smart, gifted, funny and caring "nice guy." So thank you, Richard Russo; I "heart" you and your wonderful fiction. Please write many more novels!