Book Giveaway: Matrimony, by Joshua Henkin (adult fiction)

Nearly a year ago, Joshua Henkin's Matrimony was the first book I purchased for Winter Break reading. This is a ritual for me. I make lists throughout the semester of the books I most want to read when I'm not re-reading Tolstoy, Nabokov, or Nachalo: When in Russia.

Matrimony is a New York Times Notable Book and has just come out in paperback. Joshua Henkin will send one Big A little a reader a signed copy of Matrimony. Your task is the following: Send me a two-to-three sentence explanation about why you in particular want to read a great adult novel based on the central theme of marriage. Funny is good. I'll post the winning entry a week from today.

Josh is Book Group friendly and Matrimony is a fantastic book to read with a group. Need proof? Check out his essay over at Books on the Brain. He's also been visiting the litblogs these past two weeks and I've particularly enjoyed his posts at The Elegant Variation. 24 posts in all! Don't miss "What Gets Taught in a Creative Writing Class?," "My Favorite Writing Exercise," and "Present-Tense Fiction Redux." Good stuff for writers.

Want to know more about Matrimony before entering the contest? Joshua Henkin talks all about the book here:



Joshua Henkin's home on the web.
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Crossover Book Review: Tamar, by Mal Peet

Usually when I write a review of a crossover book, I'm reviewing an adult book I think children ages twelve and up will like. This time, however, I am reviewing a book marketed to teens that adults will appreciate--Tamar, by Mal Peet. (Tamar won the 2005 Carnegie in the U.K.)

To be honest, I am not sure why Tamar is a Young Adult novel. Some sections of the book are narrated by a fifteen-year-old girl, but the vast majority of passages concern adult resistance workers in World War II. To miss Tamar, subtitled A Novel of Espionage, Passion, and Betrayal, because it's located in the Young Adult section is a betrayal, indeed.

Tamar opens with a conversation between a father--William Hyde--and his adult son. The son's wife is expecting and the father has an usual request: If the child is a girl, will his son please name her Tamar? The father gives no reasons for the request, but the son likes the name and agrees.

The reader then travels back in time to when the father (and soon-to-be-grandfather) is working for the British Secret Service with the Dutch Resistance in a small town in the Netherlands. He is one of two men working under assumed names: Tamar, the resistance organizer, or Dart, his code transmitter. Both men love the same woman, Marijke, whose house serves as a base for the young resistance workers, but only Tamar has a relationship with her.* Two men in love with the same woman, fear, starvation, and a rogue resistance worker, who rebels in spectacular fashion against Tamar's command, lead to ultimate betrayal and loss for World War II-era Tamar, Dart, and Marijke.

Interspersed with accounts of Tamar, Marijke, and Dart's lives in Nazi-occupied Netherlands are passages in which modern-day Tamar, the fifteen-year-old granddaughter of "William Hyde," tries to understand why her grandfather committed suicide just months before, when already an old man. He leaves her a box of clues--clues that will lead to the truth about his past.

Tamar is a detective story and a meditation on the meaning of truth. It's a great novel for children, sure, but it's also an important story for adult readers as well. And, good news: A little research tells me the paperback edition is out in the U.S. on September 9.
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* Yes, Tamar is biologically young Tamar's grandfather. The question is, who was William Hyde, the grandfather Tamar knew and loved in 1990s England.

Crossover Book Review: What Was Lost, by Catherine O'Flynn

Recently I complained about the adult fiction I've been reading. I kvetched about my weariness with the 20th century anti-hero. In brief, I'm tired of the over-educated, New York-living male hero who is alienated from his family and from the world.* Susan, of Chicken Spaghetti, recommended What Was Lost, a first novel by Catherine O'Flynn, and not only did I find What Was Lost a fantastic and restorative read, but I also think it is a book teenagers will enjoy as well.

What Was Lost is a novel no less ambitious than any of the top-10 New York Times reviewed novels of 2007 or 2008. Catherine O'Flynn uses many protagonists to tell her tale, most prominent among them a 10-year-old girl and two mall employees--all from Birmingham.# The novel opens in the voice of Kate Meany, 10-year-old girl detective. Kate is an orphan and she spends her days watching people in the shops and at Green Oaks--a new shopping center. She's sure she's about to catch a criminal in the act when she disappears.

The narration then skips forward twenty five years and is primarily in the voices of Kurt, a Green Oaks security guard, and Lisa, a manager at the mall's music store. Lisa has a connection to Kate: Her elder brother Adrian was a friend and mentor to Kate at the time Kate disappeared. Kate's disappearance leads, of course, to Adrian's own hiding, even though he was innocent. Kurt also has a connection to Kate, although he doesn't remember it at first. He saw Kate, on her last day in Birmingham, when he was about her own age. Kurt doesn't remember his sighting until a series of hallucinations visit him when working at the mall in the middle of the night.

What Was Lost is ostensibly a mystery--how and why did Kate Meany disappear? But it's also the story of finding your way when you're a young adult stuck in the soulless world of a suburban mall. Will Lisa be able to dump her manager's job at Your Music and her even lamer boyfriend Eric? Will Kurt be able to come to terms with his father--who hated the mall, but worked there as a janitor because there were no other jobs left for him in the city--and move on? These are real questions ninety percent of the reading public face and Catherine O'Flynn presents them with humor, grace, and intelligence.

But let's not forget our heroine who opens the story. Kate Meany, girl detective, is quite possibly the most authentic 10-year-old girl I've read in years. She's smart, vulnerable, naive, and believes in truth and justice, even in her run-down neighborhood in Birmingham. Children like Kate, who have nothing, always have hope--hope Kurt and Lisa have lost, but must find again in order to remake their lives.

I highly recommend What Was Lost to all readers ages twelve and up. Tweens and teens will be drawn to Kate's story, and the multiple points of view will challenge them. Anyone who has ever worked a dead-end job in a mall will recognize Kate's world. What Was Lost is a not-to-be-missed novel.

Thank you, Catherine O'Flynn, for restoring my faith in the "literary" novel.
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* Seriously, novelists: Stop this.
# Did you hear me? TWO MALL EMPLOYEES. They have lives too! Who would have known?

A Reader's Call for Help/Minor Rant

I'm still on the road and looking for a good book. Kate Atkinson's newest doesn't come out until July 31 in the U.K., by which time I'll be back in the States and will have to wait another six weeks for it. Here's what I'm looking for today:

• adult fiction
• novel

Here's what I'm not looking for:

I just finished reading two well-received novels and can I just say that I'm officially over the 20th century protagonist. You know the type: New York (usually), drinking problem, alienated from family, usually some connection to an Eastern European country, misanthrope, sees an Analyst/is an Analyst*, wife leaves him (usually for perfectly understandable reasons), hates dogs and/or children, makes wry comments on the failings of (usually other) human beings.

I do not want a novel featuring/narrated by this type of protagonist.

Maybe my increasing intolerance for the 20th century anti-hero is the reason why detective fiction has become a consoling feature in my reading life. Adam Dalgliesh, Jackson Brodie, Paddy Meehan, and Kurt Wallander aren't perfect people. But they mean well, have some minor hope in humanity, and, in their own ways, think they're making a difference.

So, help me out here, readers. I'm desperate for a good read.
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*Does anyone still see an Analyst in this day and age? I'll just add that I'm totally over Freud/Freudism in literature as well.
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Please excuse the Nabokov movie image. Nabokov did the 20th century anti-hero right, in my opinion, but it's also time to move on. Seriously.

On Titles

I'm a fan of mysteries--especially British and Scandinavian ones. (Of the Americans, I do like Sara Paretsky and Laura Lippman.) I especially like listening to mysteries, because I can't race through them as I do when reading.

I have been waiting and waiting for Reginald Hill's Death Comes for the Fat Man to come out on audio and it finally popped up this week. Hooray! (If you haven't read Hill's Dalziel and Pascoe series, I highly recommend it.) Only it was under its British title: The Death of Dalziel.

I hate to say it, but this time the Americans got it right. Death Comes for the Fat Man is an infinitely better title than The Death of Dalziel. (Dalziel is the Fat Man of the series--Chief Superintendent to Pascoe, who is the more intellectual of the two detectives.)

Book Review: Identical Strangers: A Memoir of Twins Separated and Reunited

Imagine you were thirty five years old and suddenly discovered you had an identical twin. That's what happened to Elyse Schein, a filmmaker living in Paris. Elyse had always known she was adopted, but when she decided to search for her birthmother, she learned instead she was born one of two identical twins.

Despite her initial shock upon discovering she's a twin, Elyse is thrilled to discover she has a sister. She's always felt someone or something was missing and learning she's one of two makes complete sense to her. When the adoption agency locates Elyse's twin sister, however, she--Paula Bernstein--is more ambivalent about being found.

Told in alternating first-person accounts, Identical Strangers: A Memoir of Twins Separated and Reunited is a fascinating exploration of twinship, adoption, and identity. Elyse and Paula discover they share much in common, despite the fact they were raised separately without any knowledge of the other's existence. They both write about film, they love the same movies, they both suffered from depression in college. What the reader learns when considering Paula and Elyse's stories is how truly different they are from one other. Elyse is more adventurous and open than her twin. But, Elyse, who has suffered more loss (the death of her adoptive mother, for example), seems needier than Paula. Paula is cagier than Elyse and protective of the life she has forged as a journalist, wife, and mother. Their unique voices and personalities demonstrate that identical DNA at birth only means so much. Nature vs. nurture? More like nature and nurture.

Identical Strangers: A Memoir of Twins Separated and Reunited is also a detective story. Paula and Elyse not only attempt to learn more about their birthmother, but they also take on the adoption agency in the hopes of discovering why they were separated and adopted out to separate families. The truth--a psychological "study"--is difficult for Paula, Elyse, and the reader to accept.

Identical Strangers is a compelling read and one teens might enjoy given its necessary focus on identity, adoption, and family.
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For more on Elyse Schein and Paula Bernstein's memoir, check out this episode of Talk of the Nation.

Favorites 2006

I still need to update my children's book favorites list for 2006. They were many and varied, but that list isn't going to finish itself until I return home on the 7th.

In the meantime, I've been thinking a lot about my favorite adult reads of 2006 and I've come up with a list.

Most overrated book: The Emperor's Children, by Claire Messud. I thought it was okay, but it didn't surprise me at all. In fact, I had guessed the ending for each individual character half-way through the book and was bummed when I found out I had divined their futures precisely.

Biggest surprise: Eat, Pray, Love, by Elizabeth Gilbert. This one really surprised me, considering I don't like yoga, or overprivileged people complaining about spoiled love affairs. Heck, I don't even like Italian food (I much prefer Indian, French, and Japanese). But I loved Eat, Pray, Love, in which Gilbert describes her year-long odyssey after a breakup in NYC to Italy (for food), India (for yoga/prayer/spiritual stuff), and Bali (the love part). Somehow, despite all my aversions to everything Gilbert adores, I still found her sympathetic and her journey compelling.

Most underrated book: A Spot of Bother, by Mark Haddon. I know everyone raved about Haddon's A Curious Incident..., but I actually preferred A Spot of Bother. It is a warm, funny novel, one I enjoyed immensely.

Favorite Book of the Year: How do I love Kate Atkinson? Let me count the ways...she's funny, she's a brilliant writer, and she's proven she can write a great mystery novel as well. One Good Turn was hands-down my favorite novel of the year. The last line of the novel is genius. (Oh, but don't peek!)

I also enjoyed, in no particular order, Absurdistan (hilarious), Suite francaise (very interesting), Arthur and George (funny, fascinating, brilliant), and The Accidental (okay, that was 2005, but I read it in Jan 2006).

Which adult reads were your favorites of 2006. What would you recommend and why?

A (Halloween) Public Service Annoucement

One of the most significant things I've learned since beginning this blog nearly two years ago, is how good YA fiction can be. Actually, I'd never really read Young Adult fiction in my life until beginning to review children's books here. A few YA titles began slipping in here and there, and, now, I'm hooked. (I can only imagine what How I Live Now would have meant to me at age 15.)

When I was about 10, I gave up children's books. I read Dickens and Twain and other entertaining, but heady stuff fed to me by my teachers and parents. I also read Stephen King, everything he wrote up to 1985 when I graduated from high school and began reading what I considered more adult fare.

So, it's been a good long while, more than 20 years, since I've read a Stephen King novel. The reviews for Lisey's Story intrigued me enough to listen to this latest King novel. And, do you know what? I really enjoyed it. True, I haven't slept for two days. But not for the typical King reasons. I haven't slept because I couldn't put my audible player down.

Lisey's Story isn't horror in the traditional sense. It isn't fantasy. It could be most accurately labeled magical realism. But it is scary. Not scary in the self-fueling-truck or returning-from-the-dead-pet sort of way. Scary in the "this-is-the-real-world-for-some-unlucky-folk" way. And it's also the story of a long, beautiful marriage and what happens to the survivor when her husband dies.

So, this is simply a public service announcement to all you adults who haven't picked up a Stephen King novel in awhile. Pick up this one.