Happy St Patrick's Day, fellow bibliophiles and book fiends! I hope that you all find time to enjoy a bit of quiet with a book after your St Pat's Day parties and get-togethers. I'm truly excited to see the weather warming up to the 60s and 70s and along with the sunshine, it's looking like Spring has sprung! Normally I am not a fan of the outdoors, or of Spring/Summer, due to pollen allergies, but this past winter was so gray and dreary, I found myself seeking a bit of warm sun. Easter is also on the horizon, so I'm hoping that the big bunny will leave some dairy and nut-free chocolate in my basket.
Meanwhile, there's a lot of news to disseminate, and some reviews as well.
The Oscars looked particularly fun and earnest this year, and I was glad to see more women and POC winners than ever before.
Bookish
Oscar Winners: Oppenheimer, Poor Things
At last night's Academy Awards ceremony
https://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/x/pjJscQfZn-UI6a9uIxtxGg~k1yJoKXv-hs8x6nAC56tpoMLg-gVdw,
several movies based on books or with book connections took home
Oscars, including the big winner Oppenheimer, which picked up seven
of the golden statuettes. This year's major category bookish Oscar
winners are:
Oppenheimer, based on the biography
American Prometheus by Kai Bird &
Martin J. Sherwin: Best picture;
directing (Christopher Nolan); actor in
a leading role (Cillian Murphy); actor
in a supporting role (Robert
Downey Jr.); cinematography (Hoyte van
Hoytema); film editing (Jennifer
Lame); music, original score (Ludwig
Gransson)
Poor Things, based on the novel by
Alasdair Gray: Actress in a leading
role (Emma Stone); costume design;
makeup and hairstyling; production
design; sound
The Zone of Interest, based on the
novel by Martin Amis: Best
international feature film
American Fiction, based on Percival
Everett's novel Erasure: Writing,
adapted screenplay (Cord Jefferson)
The Boy and the Heron, inspired by
Genzaburo Yoshino's 1937 novel How Do You Live?, which appears in the
film but is not directly connected to
the story: Best animated feature film
The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar,
based on a short story collection by
Roald Dahl: Best short film, live
action
TV:
3 Body Problem on Netflix
Netflix has released a new trailer for
3 Body Problem
https://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/x/pjJscQfZweUI6a9uI0hySQ~k1yJoKXv-hs8x6nAC8CtpoMLg-gVdw>,
based on Liu Cixin's novel The Three-Body Problem. Deadline reported
that the series, from creators David Benioff, D.B. Weiss, and
Alexander Woo, will debut March 21.
The project stars Jovan Adepo, John
Bradley, Rosalind Chao, Liam
Cunningham, Eiza González,
Jess Hong, Marlo Kelly, Alex Sharp,
Sea Shimooka, Zine Tseng, Saamer
Usmani, Benedict Wong, and Jonathan
Pryce.
This is a fascinating interview that makes me want to read the novel about this trailblazing Italian female journalist who was fearless. Having been a print journalist myself, I admire women who don't rely on nepotism to get their foot in the door, but make their way in the newsroom by paying their dues.
Anastasia Rubis on Oriana: A Novel of
Oriana Fallaci
Anastasia Rubis's writing has appeared
in the New York Times, the Huffington Post, the New York Observer,
and various literary journals. Here she discusses her debut book,
Oriana: A Novel of Oriana Fallaci, about the Italian journalist who
was best known for her provocative interviews of world leaders,
coming March 19 from Delphinium Books.
Who was Oriana Fallaci?
Oriana Fallaci was the best reporter in
the world in the 1970s, in a
class with Mike Wallace and Barbara
Walters as a kick-ass interviewer.
She was known for her revealing q&as
with world leaders, who often
regretted speaking with her, but they
did so because it was prestigious.
Oriana was totally self-made: born
working class in Florence and forced
to drop out of university to support
her family. Yet she rose to fame as
"the greatest interviewer of her
day" (Newsweek) and "a legend" (Dick
Cavett). She was a rebel and
trailblazer. She lived for many years in
Manhattan and died in 2006.
What inspired you to write about
Fallaci?
Her candid, personal style of
journalism, which jumps off the page, and
her daring to smash all the rules. She
was brilliant, confident,
audacious--she could speak her mind,
say anything to anybody. And she
was glamorous, like Joan Didion, with
Italian style and the latest
fashions, hairstyle, nail polish. She
thrilled me with how strong and
assertive a woman could be. Christiane
Amanpour has said, "I wanted to
be her!" and calls her a role
model. Oriana made a huge contribution to
journalism--she revolutionized the art
of the interview. And she
championed human rights and freedom. I
wanted to tell that story.
Is the novel timed to come out for
Women's History Month?
Yes. Women's contributions are often
overlooked by history. We're left
with the impression that women are
nice, nice--helpers and
nurturers--but the truth is, women have
always been smart, powerful,
making big decisions and leaving their
mark. We need to shine a light on
more stories of women and their
achievements.
Was Fallaci as fierce in her private
life as she was in professional
life?
No. She was two women. Privately she
was sensitive and vulnerable. Most
likely she attempted suicide once when
her heart was broken. Oriana's
story is poignant because she bulldozed
her way to the top of her
profession yet suffered setbacks in her
personal life and had deep
regrets. We don't get everything, is my
takeaway, even if we are
determined and try really, really hard.
In the 1970s, Fallaci wrote about
sexism, reproductive choice, and
work/life balance. If she were writing
today, would she find women's
lives improved?
No. Witness the #metoo movement, the
backslide in
reproductive rights, the emotional
labor carried by women, unequal pay.
Oriana said it was tough to be a woman,
but it was an adventure that was
never boring. She never regretted being
a woman, even when she had to
work twice as hard as a man to be
respected in the newsroom.
Oriana is a love story?
Yes, her big love was Alexander
Panagoulis, the Greek hero and poet she
met while interviewing. Before that,
Oriana had a seven-year
relationship with a married war
correspondent, but Alexander was her
first real partner. They had only three
years together. I won't say why.
The novel is described as sexy. Why?
Oriana was 44 and Alexander was 34. She
had the big career; he was just
out of prison as a political dissident.
But she was a workaholic and he
introduced her to the pleasures in
life: sex in the afternoon, sure, but
also swimming in the Aegean Sea and
dining at an outdoor taverna under a
starry sky.
How about examples of real-life Fallaci
grilling her interview subjects?
* To Henry Kissinger, she said: To what
degree does power fascinate you?
Try to be frank.
* To Hugh Hefner, founder of Playboy: I
am wondering if you like women,
beyond the sex, I mean.
* To Colonel Gaddafi of Libya: I
haven't told you that you are a
dictator yet. But I will now.
Christiane Amanpour has said Fallaci's
interviews should be required
reading for all journalists, and I
agree. Her collection Interview with
History and Power is still in print.
Where did Fallaci get her courage?
At age 14, she fought in the Italian
Resistance with her father against
Hitler and Mussolini, carrying a
grenade on her bicycle and secret
messages in her braids. She was in
constant danger and forced to
surmount her fear. Later, when she had
to interview a big shot in the
White House or a palace, she was not
intimidated. A childhood of fear
had burned off her fear.
I think it's about time someone honored Paul Simon for his beautiful song lyrics and his wonderful music.
PEN
America to Honor Paul Simon, Almar Latour
PEN America will present Paul Simon
with this year's PEN/Audible
Literary Service Award
https://www.shelf
awareness.com/ct/x/pjJscQfakL8I6a9uIhtyTw~k1yJoKXv-hs8x6nACJH3poMLg-gVdw
"to celebrate his indelible
lyrics, boundless contributions to our canon
and elevation of essential cultures
over nearly six decades." Almar
Latour, CEO of Dow Jones and publisher
of the Wall Street Journal, will
receive the Business Visionary award,
"reflecting his company's
commitment to the free press and
persistence in demanding the release of
Evan Gershkovich, the Journal reporter
jailed in Russia." Both
recipients will be honored May 16
during PEN America's annual Literary
Gala in Manhattan.
PEN America CEO Suzanne Nossel said:
"Paul Simon has inspired fans
worldwide with lyrics and songs that
entire generations know by heart
and can recognize from the very first
notes. His fascination with
different cultures, traditions and
rhythms have helped open our ears and
minds to essential musical traditions.
We are elated to pay tribute to
this unparalleled creative artist whose
music, along with his commitment
to humane values and humanitarian
causes, has made him a cultural icon."
Jennifer Finney Boylan, president of
PEN America and one of this year's
literary hosts, said of Latour: "At
a time when facts and truth are in
question, the Wall Street Journal's
role as a source of credible,
reported news is indispensable. Almar's
commitment to delivering trusted
news and information and building
sustainable news operations is a
lifelong calling. His fierce support
for press freedom and for Evan has
been inspiring."
I read, as did everyone else I know, Angela's Ashes, which is by Frank McCourt, and his heart-breaking. But then I read A Monk Swimming by Malachy McCourt and was blown away by the lyrical vigor of McCourt's prose. RIP to this marvelous prose stylist.
Obituary
Note: Malachy McCourt
Malachy McCourt, who "fled a
melancholic childhood in Ireland for America, where he applied his
blarney and brogue to become something of a professional Irishman as
a thespian, a barkeep and a best-selling memoirist," died March
11, the New York Times reported. He was 92.
He embarked from Ireland with a ticket
paid for with $200 in savings
sent by his older brother, Frank
McCourt, who had emigrated earlier and
was working as a public school English
teacher, and later became an
author whose books included the
Pulitzer Prize-winning autobiography
Angela's Ashes (1996).
Malachy McCourt left school in Limerick
when he was 13, two years after
his father deserted the family, leaving
his mother, Angela, to raise the
four of their surviving seven children.
"Coming out of that life, the
things that get you are the two evils
of shame on one shoulder, the
demon fear on the other," he told
the Times in 1998. "Shame says you
came from nothing, you're nobody,
they'll find you out for what you and
your mother have done. Fear says what's
the use of bothering, drink as
much as you can, dull the pain. As a
result, shame takes care of the
past, fear takes care of the future and
there's no living in the
present."
McCourt appeared regularly on TV soap
operas--notably Ryan's Hope, on
which he had a recurring role as a
bartender--and played bit parts in
several films. In the 1950s, he opened
what was considered Manhattan's
original singles bar: Malachy's, on the
Upper East Side, the Times
noted.
His bestselling book, A Monk Swimming
(1998), and Singing My Him Song (2000) evoked comparisons with his
brother's widely lauded
autobiography. "I was blamed for
not being my brother," he said. "I now
pledge to all those naysayers that
someday I will write Angela's Ashes
and change my name to Frank McCourt."
He was 11 when he first bellied up to a
bar with another preadolescent
(who became a priest) and ordered a
cider and porter (after which "we
were fluthered"), topped off with
whiskey. "The taste of alcohol allowed
me to be clever, charming and to behave
outrageously," he wrote. "Acting
also allowed me not to be me."
Among his many exploits, McCourt
smuggled gold bars from Switzerland to
India; auditioned cold for an Off
Broadway production, which led to his
first stage role, in The Tinker's
Wedding; was cast in Reversal of
Fortune, Bonfire of the Vanities and
other movies; played Henry VIII in
commercials for Imperial margarine and
Reese's peanut butter cups; and
worked as a radio and television host
("I couldn't wait to hear what I
had to say next").
As for immortalizing the past, he
advised fellow memoirists: "Write that
which shames you the most, and never
judge your own material; you will
always find it guilty.... Never show
anything to your relatives."
This disgusts and appalls me, that there are so many closed and small-minded bigots and homophobes and racists out there, attempting to remove books from libraries and school libraries in an attempt to control young minds and keep children and young adults from vital historical and social information. It's anti-American and cowardly, and I hope that these forces of evil eventually are driven back to the rocks that they crawled out from under. Ignorance and prejudice are two sides of the same coin, and both are deadly.
Book
Banning Attempts Reach All-Time High
The
American
Library Association reported
a record
number of attempts to remove books from libraries
last year, and not by a small margin. 4,240 individual titles were
targeted in 2023, up almost 65% from the 2,571 titles that were
challenged in 2022. Nearly half of the challenged titles address
LGBTQ+ identities and/or issues of race and racism, making it crystal
clear that this isn’t—and wasn’t ever—just about books.
Despite the fact that most
parents trust librarians and agree that banning books is a waste of
time,
I expect the 2024 numbers will show another increase, especially as
conservative anti-free speech activists and politicians dig in on
this losing strategy in a presidential election year.
A Grave Robbery by Deanna Raybourn is the 9th Veronica Speedwell mystery, and I hadn't realized how much I missed Stoker and Speedwell until I held their latest escapades in my hand and embarked on yet another adventure in the Gilded Age of England. Here's the blurb:
While I always adore seeing the romance and love between Stoker and Speedwell progressing, this time there was a lot of declarations of devotion, but still a refusal to commit to marriage, and with the couple going at it like rabbits throughout the novel, it strains my credulity that Speedwell hasn't "fallen" pregnant yet, despite her assurances that all the home remedies she has are all the birth control she needs. I recognize her fierce determination to remain independent and childless, and I respect that, but women of her era didn't usually have the choice, unless they were independently wealthy, to remain single. Meanwhile, much of the story arc of this book was horrific, and reminiscent of gothic stories like The Woman in White or Sherlock Holmes darker tales, or the Jack the Ripper murders, or Burke and Hare's scheme of grave robbing for the purposes of medical anatomy lessons. Not being a fan of the horror genre, I was taken aback by the lurid and bizarre discussions of death and body preservation at that time. Still, despite the gore, I love the witty banter between the brainy characters that inevitably comes up when they're trying to solve a difficult case. I'd definitely give this book an A-, and recommend it to anyone who isn't squeamish about corpses and who has read any of the other mysteries in this vibrant, well balanced series.
Take Me Home Tonight by Morgan Matson is a YA novel of theater kids left to their own devices for 24 hours in the Big Apple, NYC. This books prose sparkles and zings along a strong, if complicated plot that will keep readers turning pages into the wee hours. I certainly couldn't put it down. Here's the blurb: I love books where characters grow and discover themselves and their path due to a special place or time. It reminds me of how a trip through time and space always changes the companions on Doctor Who, making them review their lives and help others and recognize that we're all in this together,whether or not you've met aliens and traveled to distant planets in a blue English police box. So this book, with its theater kids and their complicated lives, reminded me of my own journey as a high school and then college thespian. It's my firm belief that good art, in any form, has that effect on the human soul. Kat and Stevie were initially joined at the hip, but once they got separated in NYC, they both discovered that their life choices and their path for the future was very different than they assumed it would be. I laughed heartily at the drama teacher's crappy play and his cult-like attitude toward the theater dept and it's kids, who were so anxious to please him they didn't seem to notice what a narcissistic asshat he was, and how he was abusing and gaslighting them all. I had a choir/theater teacher in junior high and high school who was like the teacher in this book, but worse, because he was having sex with both the 13 and 14 year old girls and boys during "private voice lessons." I knew what he was doing, and tried to report it to adults, but no one believed me. He was caught eventually and removed from teaching, but I always felt he should have spent the rest of his life in jail with other pedophiles. I thought the Macguffin of the dog that somehow didn't need to urinate or eat or drink or deficate once in in 24 hours to be too silly, but other than that I did enjoy this novel and would give it an A-, and a recommendation to anyone who toiled in high school theater depts as a teenager.
A Botanist's Guide to Parties and Poisons by Kate Khavari is a Saffron Everleigh mystery/adventure tale with a bit of romance woven throughout. Here's the blurb: The Lost Apothecary meets Dead Dead Girls in this fast-paced, STEMinist adventure.
Debut author Kate Khavari deftly entwines a pulse-pounding mystery with the struggles of a woman in a male-dominated field in 1923 London.
Newly minted research assistant Saffron Everleigh is determined to blaze a new trail at the University College London, but with her colleagues’ beliefs about women’s academic inabilities and not so subtle hints that her deceased father’s reputation paved her way into the botany department, she feels stymied at every turn.
When she attends a dinner party for the school, she expects to engage in conversations about the university's large expedition to the Amazon. What she doesn’t expect is for Mrs. Henry, one of the professors’ wives, to drop to the floor, poisoned by an unknown toxin.
Debut author Kate Khavari deftly entwines a pulse-pounding mystery with the struggles of a woman in a male-dominated field in 1923 London.
Newly minted research assistant Saffron Everleigh is determined to blaze a new trail at the University College London, but with her colleagues’ beliefs about women’s academic inabilities and not so subtle hints that her deceased father’s reputation paved her way into the botany department, she feels stymied at every turn.
When she attends a dinner party for the school, she expects to engage in conversations about the university's large expedition to the Amazon. What she doesn’t expect is for Mrs. Henry, one of the professors’ wives, to drop to the floor, poisoned by an unknown toxin.
Though I enjoyed the strong prose and twisty plot, I found myself being impatient with Saffron, who seemed to lack backbone until the final chapters of the book. She was always fainting and relying on men to get her out of the rash and ridiculous situations that she got herself into. (Only when she was poisoned TWICE, did she finally see the folly of her ways and question whether experimenting on herself with deadly plants was a great idea....duh). I realize women at the time, in the early 20th century, had to work twice as hard to enable themselves to get further education and funds for going on expeditions, but she was such a scaredy cat that I don't think I would have funded a desert or jungle expedition for a woman with more impulsivity than sense. And the men in the book were all typical strong and brilliant or moustache twirling bad guys, which made their moves along the plot easy to follow, because it was inevitable that they'd threaten the damsel in distress at least once before they were apprehended. Still, I'd give this book a B-, and recommend it to those who like academic themed historical mysteries and female protagonists that are always getting themselves in a pickle.
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