Dear Great Book Guru, Sea Cliff is so beautiful at this time of year - well it’s beautiful every season of the year, but the old  Victorians give an especially awesome, eerie feeling during the Fall.   I’m looking for a really good book that evokes that sense of mystery and autumnal wonder.  Thoughts?  Falling for Sea Cliff

 Dear Falling for Sea Cliff, I just finished the perfect book for you: THE GOD OF THE WOODS by Liz Moore. Set in an Adirondacks camp owned by a very wealthy family, the novel recounts the disappearance of a young camper in August 1975. The story is told from the perspectives of seven people: the parents, various campers, counselors, and the young detective assigned to the case. The family employs most of the townspeople so there is an uneasy alliance between the two groups.  The novel goes back and forth from the fifties to 1975 - where the story opens. Barbara, daughter of the wealthy VanLaar Family, is missing from her bunk – fourteen years before her eight-year-old brother disappeared and was never found.  The remainder of the book traces the impact these events have on three worlds: the opulent summer community, the camp which exists in its shadow, and the working-class townspeople who serve both worlds. This is much more than a simple thriller - it is a complex study of character, sociological impact, and history of the times. It appears on many Best Books of the Year lists, including Barak Obama’s Summer Reading List.  Highly recommended

 

Dear Great Book Guru, Last week at the Sea Cliff Mini Mart, I met up with so many friends from long ago and one of them mentioned an intriguing book about family dynamics set on  a London stage. Does it sound familiar?  Fan of Family Tales

Dear Fan of Family Tales, THE HYPOCRITE by Jo Hamya is set in Sicily and London and takes place in 2010 and 2020.  Sophia is a twenty-seven-year-old successful playwright whose latest work is about a month she had spent in Sicily ten years before with her novelist father.  Her father is in the audience for a matinee performance of her play, having no idea the play is about him - he has carefully avoided reading reviews. Sophia and her mother are having lunch above in the terrace restaurant of the playhouse. The storyline shifts from the father and his reaction to seeing his past come to life on the stage - the kitchen in Sicily, his favorite purple shirt, and most importantly the many women he entertained while his daughter slept nearby…. to the mother-daughter conversation about the play.   Her memories of the conversations she overheard, the lies and exaggerations, half truths are all acted out on stage and her father - to his horror - is portrayed as a mediocre writer and latent misogynist.  Meanwhile as Sophia and her mother lunch, a variety of characters appear to discuss the play going on in the theater below.  As her mother becomes more and more drunk and belligerent, Sophia continues to deny the play is about her family, leaving the reader to question who indeed is the hypocrite? Recommended! 

 

 

Dear Great Book Guru, I heard recently there are some great books out that are based on Charles Dickens’s novels but set in present time. Sounds very interesting…are you familiar with them? Lover of Dickens

Dear Lover of Dickens, Yes - I just finished DEMON COPPERHEAD by the award-winning author Barbara Kingsolver, and it was great!  Based on Dickens’s DAVID COPPERFIELD, this novel is set in present time Appalachia – Lee County, Virginia and many of the same issues Dickens’s addressed in 1800’s London are covered here.  Demon Copperhead - born Damon Fields - to a young drug addicted mother - tells his life story from birth to adulthood and quite a story it is.  His first years are spent with his mother and although impoverished, the pair are relatively happy. This somewhatsecure existence comes to an end when she marries Stoner, a harshly cruel man who abuses her and tortures Demon.  She soon falls back into addiction and dies leaving Demon in the care of his stepfather who turns him over to a corrupt, dehumanizing foster care system.  Demon goes from one bad situation to the next when a sports injury causes him to become addicted to doctor-prescribed painkillers.   Along the way he encounters a few caring adults, but, for the most part, family,friends, and community fail him, and it is only through his own perseverance that he manages to survive.  Like Dickens’s David, our Demon fights many demons not of his making - but those created by failures of society and its institutions. A painful tale but a very worthwhile read and highly recommended!

Dear Great Book Guru, My friends and I have decided to tackle reading the latest Booker Prize winners and I see that the group has just published their “short list” of winners.  Could you suggest a favorite of yours from this list?  Reader of Winners

Dear Reader of Winners, There are six books on this year’s list and all are great, but my favorite by far was Rachel Kushner’s CREATION LAKE. Kushner’s novel is a fascinating combination of mystery, humor, science, and spy antics.  Set in the present, it is the story of “Sadie Smith” a pseudonym for a thirty-four-year-old woman who has acted as a government agent for many years until a botched case involving a young man, five hundred pounds of explosives, and charges of entrapment cause her to be fired by the FBI.  She then sets out on a very lucrative career path as a spy-for-hire. Her first assignment is working for  a huge unnamed industrial complex that is eager to shut down an environmentalist farming commune with a long history of violence.  The mastermind/puppeteer is Bruno who had been involved in the May 1968 Paris riots. He subsequently disappeared from public view, communicating his radical ideas in emails from underground caves.  His messages are perhaps the most fascinating part of the book as he lays out his beliefs about human evolution and the superiority of the Neanderthals or Thals as he calls them. According to him, much of present-day discord and misery lies in the demise of the Thals and the ascension of the Sapiens.  Sadie finds herself rethinking her mission as she grapples with Bruno and his disciples.  A very different take on spy craft and highly recommended! 

 

 Dear Great Book Guru,  My friends and I were talking recently about a new book we would like to use for our monthly book discussion. It is a story of a family here on Long Island who deals with a devastating medical ordeal  The book reads like an unfolding mystery.  Are you familiar with it? – can’t remember the name.  Interested Reader

Dear Interested Reader, Yes - I recently read IN THE FACE OF CATASTROPHE by Jennifer Rose Goldman and Caryn Meg Hirshleifer, a remarkable tale of bravery and familial devotion.  Told from the perspectives of parents, a sibling, friends, and medical personnel, the book does indeed read like a novel with suspense and colorful characterization throughout. The story opens as Jenn, a thirty-one-year-old woman begins her workday in a well-known North Shore clothing store on – yes - the Miracle Mile! Moments into the day she suffers a massive stroke and so begins an incredible story of pain, trauma, fear, and devotion in which a seeming tragedy turns into a tale of extraordinary love and healing. Jenn, her parents and sister Amanda each tell in their own words their feelings, reactions, and the part they play during a year of unbelievable ups and downs.  Much is lost but much is gained as each of them finds strength in the face of the unknown.  There are echoes of the biblical tale of Job and his misfortunes as calamity after calamity befall the family, but the outcome is suffused with grace and gratitude.  A remarkable book that should be read by all - highly recommended!

 

Dear Great Book Guru, My favorite author is Barbara Pym and she is known among some readers as the Jerry Seinfeld of the literary world - she writes about nothing! Recently I read about a new novel that deals with just that: nothing really.  Have you heard of it? Into Nothing

Dear Into Nothing, Yes, I recently read THE ANTHROPOLOGISTS by Aysegul Savas and immediately thought of Pym. This is the story of the daily routines of Asya and Manu, a couple from an unknown country and set in yet another unknown country as they search for an apartment.  Each apartment offers a different way of life - depending on views, number of rooms, type of kitchen, location…  the multitude of small details that come together to make up a life. They take great pleasure in imagining each of the different scenarios the various apartments suggest. As they search, life goes on as parents and grandparents age, friendships are formed and broken, meals are described, consumed and forgotten.  Asya is a videographer, and she is determined to record a nearby park with its seasonal transitions, again emphasizing the delicate beauty of subtle change. The couple form a friendship with an elderly neighbor, and we observe the myriad of change that comes with age.  Throughout, we are party to Asya and Manu’s lives where nothing dramatic occurs, but their lives are recognized as being made up of fragmented beauty. The reader is inevitably made to think about and cherish those many barely remembered moments that indeed make up a life.  Highly recommended!

 

 Dear Great Book Guru, With the beginning of the new school year, I feel the need to start a weekly reading regimen.  Do you have an engrossing, worthwhile, short book you would recommend? Starting in September

Dear Starting in September, I just finished a fascinating book and – yes - it’s only 238 pages: THE SAFEKEEP by Yael Van Der Wouden. Set in the Netherlands in 1961, the novel opens with Isabel – a quirky thirtyish year-old woman discovering a broken piece of pottery. Isabel lives in her dead mother’s country home and sees very few people.  Her brothers Hendrik and Louis live in the city and visit for a day or so twice a year. Her life is very circumscribed so when Louis insists his latest girlfriend Eva stay with Isabel for a month while he is on a business trip, Isabel is furious and totally unsettled.  Eva is the opposite of Isabel in every way. She sleeps late, dresses garishly, talks loudly and incessantly, but worst of all - she is not careful with the household treasures. The tension builds with Isabel counting the days until Eva will leave, but suddenly things begin to disappear, and the two women are confronted by mysterious happenings that draw them together. Soon we see that the house itself is a character.  Vestiges of World War II permeate the landscape and minds of both Eva and Isabel, leaving the reader to question if either woman can be trusted.   Highly recommended!