A Wake Up Call

The Awakening by Kate Chopin
New York: Bantam Books, 1992.
xx, 211 p. ; 18 cm.

This 1899 novel is on our student's AP list, and it is one that I've meant to get around to reading.  It's interesting because when I told my partner I was reading it, she said, "But you read that years ago!" I said, "No way, I'd remember that."  But she reminded me of the ending scene (which I won't give away here) and it suddenly dawned on me - oh yeah, I sure did!

In discussing my REreading of The Awakening, I said how - though it has a bit of the melodramatic, flowery style of the late 19th century - there is a lot to this novel that is decades ahead of its time and reminded me of the early writings of feminist movement writings of the 1950s and 60s (Betty Friedan's Feminine Mystique comes readily to mind). My partner mentioned that I should listen to Diane Rehm' show where she discusses Chopin's novel with several guests - that podcast is on my to-do list.

The novel is really a great study of the emergence of a feminist consciousness in a woman hemmed in by the constraints of a conventional white, upper-class life in late 19th century New Orleans.  Edna, the main character is a woman of restless passion, spirit and longings who settled early for having a family and sharing her life with a wealthy, decent man who is nevertheless condescending and patronizing toward her - but clearly not her equal in passion, curiosity and spirit.  The novel deals with all the complications and turmoil that ensues from Edna's struggle to escape the confines of the narrow role she is in at the beginning of the novel.

I think many young people would enjoy the novel well enough.  It is relatively short and the structure is straightforward.  However, I think many students would find it interesting (and surprising) that the novel was so controversial - since by today's standards it is so tame as to be almost bland.

Briefer for Busier Times

I'm not sure how many years it's been since I read Stephen Hawking's phenomenal best seller - A Brief History of Time.  It was published in 1988, and I'm guessing I read it at some time in the mid 1990s.  I recall finding parts of it really fascinating, but much of it a bit overwhelming - so I was really pleased to see that Hawking and collaborator, Leonard Mlodinow teamed up to reissue a revised, renamed and somewhat easier version of the classic.

This Briefer History of Time is a great introduction for the lay person, and of course for the interested high school student, to major concepts of cosmology, including the somewhat mind-bending concepts of Einstein's theories of general and special relativity - and the truly mind-blowing and bizarre concepts of quantum and string theory.

I found the inclusion of God in this work to be problematic.  Instead of discussing how current theories relate to beliefs in God, the authors at times seem to just assume - without evidence that God does exist.  Consider this excerpt from a discussion of the search for unified theories:

"Actually, the idea that God might want to change his mind is an example of the fallacy, pointed out by St. Augustine, of imagining God as a being existing in time.  Time is a property only of the universe that God created.  Presumably, He knew what He intended when He set it up!"

And a bit later in the book, in the conclusion they write:

"The question remains, however: how or why were the laws and the initial state of the universe chosen?" ("[C]hosen" seems an odd choice of language here)! 

I think it would have just been better to include a separate chapter on the religious implications of the current state of cosmology, but regardless, the book is still very strong and compelling.

All The World's a Maze

Source of graphic

The Maze Runner by James Dashner
New York : Delacorte Press, c2009.
375 p. ; 22 cm.

This powerful and well-reviewed novel finds the main character - Thomas - entering a strange world as disoriented and confused as the reader.  The novel is set in a prison-like construct of the Glade where one teen boy is  delivered once a month by a one-way elevator.  The Glade is at the center of a massive maze, many square miles in expanse and populated by the half-animal/half-machine Grievers - large and agile slug-like creatures bristling with instruments of carnage and pain (saws, pincers, needles, etc).  The Grievers are especially active at night, when the massive walls of the Glade slide shut - and the massive walls of the maze rearrange themselves.

The novel revolves around Thomas and the other Gladers trying to find a solution to the maze, trying to figure out what malign agents have put them in the Glade, and trying to recover any memories of their lives before being delivered to the Glade.  Each boy has arrived in the Glade with his memory wiped, and able to sense and recover some memories from the past.  The action of the novel is raised to a pitch and pushed toward a dramatic climax by the delivery of a girl - a first, and the sudden end of the predicable patterns of the Glade - no more sunshine, no more deliveries of supplies, and no more closed walls at night when the Grievers are at their most predatory and active.

Several reviews I read felt that this was a great introductory novel to the sequels which will follow - see the series website here - but I found myself enjoying the novel as a metaphor for the human condition.  Like the boys and one girl in the glade, we find ourselves born into a world of malign forces over which we have almost no control, in which many of us have to struggle for survival in often tedious, meaningless ways, and where we are forever trying to figure out where we came from, where we are going and "what it all means."  This existential horror was what I really loved about this book.  The book leads to a half-resolution, setting itself up for a sequel - and this is probably what will draw many readers in as they look forward to learning about the world outside the maze, the purpose of the maze and the life and death adventures of the young men and young woman from the Glade.

This book might well appeal to fans of The Hunger Games and compares in an interesting way to The City of Ember.  I also thought of Ender's Game and Lord of the Flies as other books that could be compared to this  new dystopian novel.

The View from the Attic

Graphic from publisher W.W. Norton

Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys

New York : Norton, [1992], c1966.
189 p. ; 21 cm

I added Wide Sargasso Sea to our collection because it was on a list of AP literature titles and many of our teachers require students to pick from AP titles.  It may sound silly, but I was attracted to the book initially by its beautiful and evocative title. When I saw it described as a book that explores the back story of crazy Bertha in the attic from Brontë's Jane Eyre, I knew I had to read it.

It is a finely written book, capturing the clashing worldviews of post-slavery Jamaica and the conflicts between impoverished locals, former elite locals, and new European interlopers. Of course the age-old conflict of men oppressing women is also at the heart of the story.

It's a great read, in that it is told convincingly from the two main characters points of view - Mr. Rochester and his rushed bride Antoinette, who will become the crazy woman in the attic of Brontë's Jane Eyre.

It's not an easy read right off; it's suggestive, dreamy and atmospheric and a little tricky to get situated into, but once you've oriented yourself as a reader, it is a delight.  It has not circulated much among students, but that doesn't surprise me too much as it would be a weighty read for any young person. However, I'll definitely be mentioning it to readers who want novels with strong literary qualities - or any readers who are fans of Jane Eyre.

Local Time (Traveling That Is)

Tempest by Julie Cross
New York : Thomas Dunne Books/St. Martin's Griffin, 2012, c2011.
339 p. ; 22 cm.

When I heard that there was a new, future blockbuster (time will tell) YA book out there - and that the author was a local author, I knew I had to order it for our library and read it.

Tempest, as other reviewers have pointed out, is a potent read (sci-fi, thriller, romantic drama, and part fantasy) revolving around a 19-year old young man who only lately realizes he can time travel short distances and soon discovers that his Dad may not be his Dad and his time traveling is of great (and dangerous) interest to his Dad, the CIA, and a shadowy group called the Enemies of Time. As he tries to escape harm and figure out who is friend and foe - he discovers that he can travel further back in time than he thought - and becomes stuck (for quite a while) two years in his past.

This book should appeal to a wide range of readers, male and female - given it's dramatic action combined with its elements of science fiction and romance.  I found it readable and enjoyable, but it didn't grab me with the power that I thought it would.  Perhaps, like some of the negative reviewers on Goodreads, I found the plot to be a bit overstretched at times (several times I had to thumb back to the beginning of chapters to find out what year it was supposed to be). Like other negative critics I didn't find the main character Jackson, a somewhat egotistical user, to be all that likable. A few other things bugged me: the apparent inherent "goodness" of the CIA (that is sci-fi fantasy, indeed!) and the sudden transformation of Jackson into an almost superhuman action hero near the end of the book.  I also couldn't help but feeling that the jarring introduction of the little girl who takes Jackson on a rather confusing trip to a grim, distant future - and the clumsy way the "bad guy" gets away at the end - were dictated by the publisher's marketing desire to have the novel develop into a very lucrative trilogy - alas...

Problems aside, I think that Tempest will be a popular book and it does require levels of reader engagement that are positive.  I will certainly be recommending it and will be curious to see what students think of it.

I Weathered Wuthering Heights

Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë
London ; New York : Penguin Books, 2003.
liv, 353 p. : geneal. table ; 20 cm. 


Wuthering Heights is one of those classics of English literature that I probably should have read long ago, but somehow never did. It is a novel that continues to circulate and so I wanted to familiarize myself with it. 

It's surprising to me that the novel is as highly praised as it is. Introducing a collection of essays on Wuthering Heights, critic Harold Bloom calls it "authentically sublime" and easily links it "as unique and idiosyncratic a narrative as Moby Dick." I would agree that there is a powerful strangeness to Brontë's novel - characters behave in ways that break the bounds of social norms and are frequently drawn to one another as in proportion to how cruelly they treat each other.  In this sense, Wuthering Heights is truly modern, but with a plot that is exceedingly convoluted and filled with gaps - I would hesitate to hold it up to Moby Dick.  To me it is an impressive but deeply flawed work of art.

As examples of these "gaps" I would cite the strange affection for Heathcliff that his adopted father has for him, the utter transformation of young Catherine during her five week convalescence at the Hintons, and the completely inexplicable transformation of Heathcliff into a man of education and money after his mysterious years long absence.

I guess to over analyze the novel is to miss the appeal of its anti-love love story and its brooding, foreboding strangeness - a world of sullen, cruel, angry drunken and bitter people locked in a predatory universe of rural England lit by the dim prospect of redemptive love (at the very end).  It is a world into which the first narrator, a short term tenant, falls and then flees - but not before getting the bulk of the story from the second and most substantial narrator, Nelly Dean.

Wes Moore Wes Moore and a Mirror for America

The Other Wes Moore by Wes Moore
New York : Spiegel & Grau Trade Paperbacks, 2011, c2010.
Spiegel & Grau trade pbk. ed.
xiv, 250 p. : ill. ; 21 cm.



     "Two years after I returned from Oxford, I was still thinking about the story...."

So writes Wes Moore in the introduction to his fine book.  The story he was still thinking about was the arrest and conviction for murder of a young man from his home town of Baltimore, MD. What made this crime story compelling, was that the man sentenced to life in prison as an accessory to an armed robbery ending in murder not only was from his hometown, but was about his age, and had the exact same name as the author - Wes Moore.

The details of the case eventually led him to contact the prisoner, and so began a correspondence and series of interviews which led the author to write this book exploring why his life has been so successful and the other Wes Moore's so tragic, even though they both had many similar experiences of hardship and life on the street.

Thankfully, Moore offers no pat answers, but instead presents an unflinching view of how susceptible young African American males are to the social forces and the draw of antisocial and criminal behavior - especially given the tough circumstances that exist for the urban poor - unemployment, disappearing funding for education, lack of present adult role models, and pervasive crime and drug trafficking.  Moore never excuses the violent or destructive acts of people, but he is careful to note that the difference between success and tragic failure for young men like himself is often a combination of timing, luck, and the intervention of concerned adults. The author was fortunate to have a Mom who sent him first to a private school, and then to a military school before his life spun out of control  This was possible only because of the great sacrifices his family was able to make. 

This dual autobiography/biography was given to the UHS library by a student who recommended it to me.  It is definitely a story that is bound to appeal to many young people - especially in that it is hopeful without being preachy and yet filled with details of the rough life of the urban streets that appeals to so many young readers.

The book includes an appendix of resources for youth.