Skylight Confessions by Alice Hoffman
Another magical/supernatural tale that is Hoffman’s signature. The jacket says it best – “three generations haunted by love”. When 17-yr-old Arlyn decides that the next man to walk down her street will be her true love, a spell is cast over John Moody and their future sealed – for better or worse. Connecticut tie-in with Yale and surrounding areas as part of the setting. Enjoyable – though sometimes hard to like the main characters. Worth reading if you like Hoffman’s style.
Harlan Coben has written another page turner with his latest, The Woods. It’s typical Coben, featuring a likeable protagonist in a setting with seemingly insurmountable problems. The plot centers around the mysterious murder and disappearance of teenagers at a summer camp decades before. In usual Coben fashion, it somehow gets resolved at the end but he is a skilled enough writer to keep you reading.
It’s possible that Jim Harrison is the most underrated American author alive today. He’s written a number of elegant works of fiction, including “Dalva”, “The Woman Lit by Fireflies”, and “Legends of the Fall” – all encompassing his love of the outdoors, native American culture, and the joys of great food and booze. His latest, “Returning to Earth”, may well be a masterpiece.
Based throughout the Midwest, this is the story of Donald, a strong, proud and unassuming man of Chippewa-Finnish decent, quickly wasting away from Lou Gehrig’s disease. He wants to preserve his family’s history and starts the book by telling his stories to his wife. The last three parts – starting with the voice of a close friend, his brother-in-law and, finally his wife – continue the narrative with each reflecting about the peaks and valleys traveled together as well as their own personal, spiritual quests.
In the wife Cynthia’s section, Harrison shows his artistry in capturing her struggles to deal with losing her husband and searching for a way to fill the void:
“Lust and anguish, and the burgeoning of something more we never quite understand, the smallest but most ungodly powerful niche in the human genome, as meaningful as topsoil and rain.”
Harrison often writes about death – or at least ways of dying with some dignity. He also delves into nuanced, complex family relations and how early and often a parent can derail a young life. “Returning to Earth” encompasses all of this with tales of redemption juxtaposed with tales of those who fall into an abyss and can’t pull themselves out.
“Returning to Earth” directs us to return our attention to what’s really important: embracing the natural world; relishing a good meal; going outside the straight-and-narrow to find one’s own spiritual center. I hope more people discover the treasure that is Jim Harrison. I’ll wear out my library card checking out any of titles I haven’t yet read and revisiting those I have.
–Mike Quincy
I just finished Divided Minds:Twin Sisters and Their Journey through Schizophrenia by Pamela Spiro Wagner and Carolyn Spiro. I picked it up after a high school reunion in New Haven. People were talking about the author (Pamela) who had graduated from the Day Prospect Hill School the same year we had graduated from a similar small girls private school. Both sisters attend Brown, one becomes a psychiatrist and the other institutionalized. It’s quite the memoir and a riveting look at mental illness and how it affects families.
Loving Frank by Nancy Horan. You will be wrapped up in the love affair of Frank Llyod write and Mamah Cheney. Based on their notorious romance, this novel is can’t put down material.
Just in time for the latest exhibit at the Wadsworth Atheneum, I am reading Eugene Gaddis’ biography of Chick Austin, one of the most innovative, creative, outlandish museum directors ever! Magician of the Modern: Chick Austin and the Transformation of the Arts in America. I am only half way through, but reading about his career, his efforts to put Hartford on the arts map in America and the good old boys’ network of museum curatorship is a hoot. Who knew he tried to start an American ballet troupe in good old Hartford, directed by none other than George Balanchine? This year is Chick’s year with a tribute at the Wadsworth and a play about him and his wife at the Hartford Stage. If only the Wadsworth could find someone to steer its ship with half as much elan as Chick.
It is 2075, commercial space travel is fairly commonplace.
There are settlements in orbit and on the moon.
The manned mission to Jupiter is in the planning stages.
Yet, millions starve on the Earth’s surface.
There is very little scifi in “Planetes.”
There are no force shields, if a loose screw hits your spaceship you could die.
The series starts with an accident that proves that ignoring space debris cannot be done anymore.
Our story follows not the explorers, but the janitors who clean the space lanes.
This involves going out in spacesuits and grabbing various satellites and junk.
Collecting debris is not profitable and the team is not respected in the company.
The team is made up of
Hachirota Hoshino AKA Hachimaki
newcomer Ai Tanabe
senior staff Fee Carminchael and Yuri Mihairokon
two useless supervisors and a terrific temp worker.
One plotline follows Hachimaki and Tanabe’s growing relationship, the people they meet and coming to terms with their feelings.
The other major plotlines is about terrorists, the Space Defense Front (SDF) who despise mankind going into space when there is some much suffering on Earth that has not be dealt with first. Sickness, starvation and wars against weaker powers.
In episode six some of the team travels to the moon.
There Hachimaki and Tanabe meet a group of non-Japanese tourists who do all the ninja tricks seen in “Naruto” and “Ku Fu Hustle” in the low gravity. This was funny and painful to watch. It is believable that people would do that.
Episodes 7-10 feature Hachimaki meeting Nono, a child born on the moon. She lacks the strength to ever live in Earth’s gravity. She does not realize how tragic her life is.
The backstory of Yuri’s sad past. When it seems he finally reaches peace, the series breaks your heart again.
Things come to ahead in episode 12 “A Modest Request.” Fee is a smoker and the SDF have been bombing the special smoking rooms set aside for that purpose.
Going without a fix she becomes desperate to light up. Only to be foiled again and again by the fire fighting system.
When the team goes to collect debris, it turns out to be a rocket that launches at the teams space station in order to ram and destroy it, Fee loses it. Ramming the collection ship into the oncoming rocket.
The series is a mix of drama and comedy.
Towards the end it stays strictly in the drama side.
I was surprised to see that instead of coming together to fight the terrorists the team members are set up to die alone. I did not see that coming.
The series ends on a positive note though.
There is much said about the human spirit, always moving forwards. “Is that sometimes a bad thing?”
Ask the terrorist and Hachimaki’s inner demon.
Space travel is hard. Falling in love is an easy way out.
Interesting is how the SDF is handled. Doing the wrong things for the right reasons.
Caving into terrorists’ demands can be the right choice.
It’s a Beecher renaissance what with the biography The Most Famous Man in America: the Biography of Henry Ward Beecher by Debby Applegate and Harriet and Isabella by Patricia O’Brien. This novel of the Beecher sisters, Isabella Beecher Hooker and her more famous sister, Harriet Beecher Stowe, tells the story of their relationship as affected by the trial for adultery of their famous brother (and preacher) Henry Ward Beecher. Enjoyable historical fiction read.
Eileen said
Skylight Confessions by Alice Hoffman
Another magical/supernatural tale that is Hoffman’s signature. The jacket says it best – “three generations haunted by love”. When 17-yr-old Arlyn decides that the next man to walk down her street will be her true love, a spell is cast over John Moody and their future sealed – for better or worse. Connecticut tie-in with Yale and surrounding areas as part of the setting. Enjoyable – though sometimes hard to like the main characters. Worth reading if you like Hoffman’s style.
Nancy said
Harlan Coben has written another page turner with his latest, The Woods. It’s typical Coben, featuring a likeable protagonist in a setting with seemingly insurmountable problems. The plot centers around the mysterious murder and disappearance of teenagers at a summer camp decades before. In usual Coben fashion, it somehow gets resolved at the end but he is a skilled enough writer to keep you reading.
Mike Quincy said
Book Review: “Returning to Earth” by Jim Harrison
It’s possible that Jim Harrison is the most underrated American author alive today. He’s written a number of elegant works of fiction, including “Dalva”, “The Woman Lit by Fireflies”, and “Legends of the Fall” – all encompassing his love of the outdoors, native American culture, and the joys of great food and booze. His latest, “Returning to Earth”, may well be a masterpiece.
Based throughout the Midwest, this is the story of Donald, a strong, proud and unassuming man of Chippewa-Finnish decent, quickly wasting away from Lou Gehrig’s disease. He wants to preserve his family’s history and starts the book by telling his stories to his wife. The last three parts – starting with the voice of a close friend, his brother-in-law and, finally his wife – continue the narrative with each reflecting about the peaks and valleys traveled together as well as their own personal, spiritual quests.
In the wife Cynthia’s section, Harrison shows his artistry in capturing her struggles to deal with losing her husband and searching for a way to fill the void:
“Lust and anguish, and the burgeoning of something more we never quite understand, the smallest but most ungodly powerful niche in the human genome, as meaningful as topsoil and rain.”
Harrison often writes about death – or at least ways of dying with some dignity. He also delves into nuanced, complex family relations and how early and often a parent can derail a young life. “Returning to Earth” encompasses all of this with tales of redemption juxtaposed with tales of those who fall into an abyss and can’t pull themselves out.
“Returning to Earth” directs us to return our attention to what’s really important: embracing the natural world; relishing a good meal; going outside the straight-and-narrow to find one’s own spiritual center. I hope more people discover the treasure that is Jim Harrison. I’ll wear out my library card checking out any of titles I haven’t yet read and revisiting those I have.
–Mike Quincy
Nancy said
I just finished Divided Minds:Twin Sisters and Their Journey through Schizophrenia by Pamela Spiro Wagner and Carolyn Spiro. I picked it up after a high school reunion in New Haven. People were talking about the author (Pamela) who had graduated from the Day Prospect Hill School the same year we had graduated from a similar small girls private school. Both sisters attend Brown, one becomes a psychiatrist and the other institutionalized. It’s quite the memoir and a riveting look at mental illness and how it affects families.
kolbrp said
Loving Frank by Nancy Horan. You will be wrapped up in the love affair of Frank Llyod write and Mamah Cheney. Based on their notorious romance, this novel is can’t put down material.
Richmond Library said
Just in time for the latest exhibit at the Wadsworth Atheneum, I am reading Eugene Gaddis’ biography of Chick Austin, one of the most innovative, creative, outlandish museum directors ever! Magician of the Modern: Chick Austin and the Transformation of the Arts in America. I am only half way through, but reading about his career, his efforts to put Hartford on the arts map in America and the good old boys’ network of museum curatorship is a hoot. Who knew he tried to start an American ballet troupe in good old Hartford, directed by none other than George Balanchine? This year is Chick’s year with a tribute at the Wadsworth and a play about him and his wife at the Hartford Stage. If only the Wadsworth could find someone to steer its ship with half as much elan as Chick.
David Anderson said
Japanese animation series “Planetes.”
It is 2075, commercial space travel is fairly commonplace.
There are settlements in orbit and on the moon.
The manned mission to Jupiter is in the planning stages.
Yet, millions starve on the Earth’s surface.
There is very little scifi in “Planetes.”
There are no force shields, if a loose screw hits your spaceship you could die.
The series starts with an accident that proves that ignoring space debris cannot be done anymore.
Our story follows not the explorers, but the janitors who clean the space lanes.
This involves going out in spacesuits and grabbing various satellites and junk.
Collecting debris is not profitable and the team is not respected in the company.
The team is made up of
Hachirota Hoshino AKA Hachimaki
newcomer Ai Tanabe
senior staff Fee Carminchael and Yuri Mihairokon
two useless supervisors and a terrific temp worker.
One plotline follows Hachimaki and Tanabe’s growing relationship, the people they meet and coming to terms with their feelings.
The other major plotlines is about terrorists, the Space Defense Front (SDF) who despise mankind going into space when there is some much suffering on Earth that has not be dealt with first. Sickness, starvation and wars against weaker powers.
In episode six some of the team travels to the moon.
There Hachimaki and Tanabe meet a group of non-Japanese tourists who do all the ninja tricks seen in “Naruto” and “Ku Fu Hustle” in the low gravity. This was funny and painful to watch. It is believable that people would do that.
Episodes 7-10 feature Hachimaki meeting Nono, a child born on the moon. She lacks the strength to ever live in Earth’s gravity. She does not realize how tragic her life is.
The backstory of Yuri’s sad past. When it seems he finally reaches peace, the series breaks your heart again.
Things come to ahead in episode 12 “A Modest Request.” Fee is a smoker and the SDF have been bombing the special smoking rooms set aside for that purpose.
Going without a fix she becomes desperate to light up. Only to be foiled again and again by the fire fighting system.
When the team goes to collect debris, it turns out to be a rocket that launches at the teams space station in order to ram and destroy it, Fee loses it. Ramming the collection ship into the oncoming rocket.
The series is a mix of drama and comedy.
Towards the end it stays strictly in the drama side.
I was surprised to see that instead of coming together to fight the terrorists the team members are set up to die alone. I did not see that coming.
The series ends on a positive note though.
There is much said about the human spirit, always moving forwards. “Is that sometimes a bad thing?”
Ask the terrorist and Hachimaki’s inner demon.
Space travel is hard. Falling in love is an easy way out.
Interesting is how the SDF is handled. Doing the wrong things for the right reasons.
Caving into terrorists’ demands can be the right choice.
Rated 13 and older.
Joan said
It’s a Beecher renaissance what with the biography The Most Famous Man in America: the Biography of Henry Ward Beecher by Debby Applegate and Harriet and Isabella by Patricia O’Brien. This novel of the Beecher sisters, Isabella Beecher Hooker and her more famous sister, Harriet Beecher Stowe, tells the story of their relationship as affected by the trial for adultery of their famous brother (and preacher) Henry Ward Beecher. Enjoyable historical fiction read.