Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy by John LeCarre. I was reading some article several years ago about spy novels in which they said everyone should read Tinker, Tailor by LeCarre. I’ve never read any of his books – somewhat on purpose; it’s a long story – but decided to get this one and read it. And then see the movie. I didn’t love reading it, although I can see how it would work well as a movie. I liked the main character, George Smiley, the British CIA character who is doing the sleuthing, but overall I found it confusing, and felt like I had to work too hard to figure everything out, and simultaneously not inspired at all to do so. So: check, check! I’ve read a LeCarre book, and won’t be doing it again, I don’t think.
Happiness Is An Inside Job by Sylvia Boorstein. I really enjoyed this book. It was the right length for a self-help-ish book (short), and Boorstein’s tone was exquisite. She doesn’t lecture, or overload with examples, and has a great knack for getting straight to the heart of the matter. It is about mindfulness from a Buddhist point of view, really, and how to not let negative emotions and thoughts run rampant. She is wise and I was left with much food for thought.
The Mindful Way Through Anxiety by Susan M. Orsillo and Lizabeth Roemer. This is a book about how to control your anxiety through mindfulness instead of, say, meds. It could definitely have been shorter, and I got a little tired of the examples, which were bereft of ambivalence, but I cannot quibble with many of the insights offered. Orsillo and Roemer walk the reader through arresting anxiety by confronting and dissecting it, as well as really delving into the “muddy emotions” which generally surround anxiety. I also am a big proponent of knowing your own underlying impulses: you can’t have the same negative reactions again and again if you truly understand why you have them in the first place. It’s a helpful book, although I’d recommend skimming it in parts.
Your 6 Year-Old: Loving & Defiant by Louise Bates Ames and Frances L. Ilg. I’ve read all these books as Owen reaches the ages except for the 5 year-old one, and they are helpful (as long as one skips the dated ectomorph /mesomorph chapter and overlooks a lot of the BLATANT sexism). It is always oddly reassuring to see that one’s child’s annoying aspects are mostly just a result of the age he happens to be. It makes it easier to choose one’s battles. Six is not an easy age, in case you all are wondering. You want to be the best at everything and know the most, and you get very upset when confronted with contrary facts. But at the same time, six is very enthusiastic and loving, and still considers his/her parents to be the smartest and most wonderful people ever. So there’s that!
Blood, Salt, Water by Denise Mina. I decided I couldn’t wait and went ahead and read the last (so far) of the Alex Morrow series. It was as wonderful as all the others. I really think Asa Larsson and Denise Mina are the best mystery/crime writers I have read thus far. Mina’s writing is so wonderful. Her prose is sparing: she tells you the minimum you need to know, yet it ends up being just the right amount. She’s also kind to her characters in a way I’ve come to appreciate. In this one, Alex is investigating a disappearance in Helensburgh, a resort town outside of Glasgow. There is a woman in town who is not whom she seems to be, and of course there are all sorts of competing interests in the police force regarding money and power. It’s quietly superb.
Bring Me Back by B.A. Paris. I have mixed feelings about this one. I kept reading that it’s the kind of book one can’t put down – and it definitely was that. I was excited to read it and annoyed when I had to stop, upon which I would wonder what was happening until the next time I could read again. It is suspenseful, certainly. But ultimately, the “answer” or discovery or what have you, was so particular and/or contrived, that I found the book disappointing on the whole. The premise is that twelve years ago, Finn was on vacation with his girlfriend, Layla, when they stopped at a rest stop in France and when he came out of the restroom, Layla had disappeared. Twelve years pass in which Layla has never been found and Finn has been exonerated of any crime. Finn is now living and romantically involved with Layla’s sister Ellen, when he starts getting emails from someone who might or might not be Layla. It’s a good premise, if you can get past that “romantically involved with Layla’s sister” part. Because, ew. But ultimately it is all a bit too fantastic.
If We Had Known by Elise Juska. This is an excellent book and I highly recommend it. It concerns the aftermath of a shooting – but it isn’t about the actual shooting, per se, but more the people who get caught up in the wake very distantly. A young man shoots people in a mall in Maine; he was a former student at a Maine university, and the main character, Maggie, who teaches writing at the university, realizes he was a student of hers five years ago. One of her students from that class writes a post on facebook about how the shooter as a student was scary and that there were warning signs, and the post goes viral, setting off a chain of events. The other main character of the book is Maggie’s 18 year-old daughter, Anna, who is going off to college in Boston for the first time. Anna is recovering from anxiety issues, and the shooting plus her mother’s connection to it, trigger Anna’s anxiety. Juska’s characters are excellently created – they are flawed and real, cerebral and interesting. There aren’t many details of the shooting, which I thought was a good choice: it’s more a book about how the rest of us carry on.
Into The Raging Sea: Thirty-Three Mariners, One Megastorm, and the Sinking of El Faro by Rachel Slade. I loved this book, too, and couldn’t wait to read it each night. I drove my family crazy talking about it non-stop too. It was just so interesting! I had heard about the sinking of the ship when it happened, but didn’t know that much about it. Slade does a great job going into detail about the people working on the ship, and describing the business decisions and personal decisions that led to El Faro sailing straight towards Hurricane Joaquin. There were so many moments when the captain could have turned the ship around, yet didn’t, and although he was certainly to blame, Slade shows how the TOTE company’s cost-saving measures were the true reason the ship went down – in multiple different ways. It was fascinating reading about the lives of the people on the ship and the many jobs that are done on board, as well as the history of the shipping industry. And her description of the last few hours is terrifying and heartbreaking.
The Seas by Samantha Hunt. This book is beautifully poetic and well written, and thirty years ago I would have been absolutely enthralled with it. It’s half fantasy, half real, and the line between the two is crossed to the point where the reader isn’t quite sure which is which. Hunt does this well. The narrator of the book is a 19 year-old girl, and a 19 year-old girl In Love, at that. That’s the part that I would have loved when I was closer to that age, and was a bit exasperated with at the age I am now. She lives in a town on the coast in the north – I don’t think it is named as Maine, but clearly is. Her father was an alcoholic who walked into the sea and presumably drowned when she was eight, and who told the narrator that like him, she was from and of the sea and was a mermaid. She’s in love with Jude, a returned Iraqi war veteran, who has major PTSD. Her love for Jude is fierce, and not returned, although he spends time with her. The narrator is funny and passionate, and her grasp on reality is tenuous. She thinks that since she is a mermaid, her father in the sea wants to kill Jude, so that she will not marry him and remain on land. It is very well done, especially how the reader has to piece together what is actually happening from what the narrator thinks is happening. It’s a book of haunting originality.
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