Americans in Paris

I just finished "American in Paris: Life & Death Under Nazi Occupation by Charles Glass. On this Veteran's Day I am still amazed by the courage of all Veterans who served in WWII. This book captures the lives of Americans in Paris who risked their lives to help RAF and US airmen who were shot down over France during the occupation to escape back to England and to continue the fight against the Axis forces. What brave men, to be willing to continue to fight after being shot down and/or injured. We have no idea of their courage. It took courage to defy the Nazis knowing of their tactics of retribution: being killed as a hostage when any attempt to resist was detected. And to be working as a spy against the Nazis when it appeared to your friends and co-workers that you were collaborating with the enemy. What a conundrum that would be, I cannot comprehend. We Americans owe everything to the courage of these men and women, veterans or resistance. That book left me with many unanswered questions: what happened to Petain after the war? Where did the millions that Charles Bedaux have in his businesses end up? How did the French fare after the war? Did the people of the French Resistance get a hand in the government after all their sacrifices to fight fascism? Ah, to find more books to read, my greatest pleasure at this stage in my life. I also re-read, " With My Heart in My Mouth" by Duncan Norton-Taylor about the war in the Pacific as the tide was turning in our favor.The battle of Kula Gulf was detailed in this book by a 40-some war correspondent who was not trained to be a soldier. He survived the war  to become the managing editor of fortune magazine, retiring in 1967. War correspondents in this time and then should also be commended for their bravery. (Musing of a chicken at heart.)

Bel Canto by Ann Patchett

I just finished Ann Patchett's famous book, Bel Canto. It takes place in a unnamed South American country. The Vice President is hosting a birthday party, and he invites the famous opera singer to perform. The house has over one hundred guests, and after the sixth song, the lights go out, and a terrorist group from the jungle has taken all of the guests hostage. Friendships are made, and the barrior between the hostages and their captors breaks down. The writer has done a marvelous job of getting into the personalities of the characters. Put into a strange relationship with each other, they are all calmed when the opera singer decides that she needs to practice her singing, and finds an uxexpected accomplice in the guest list of cororate leaders from various countries. Gen, the translator for the Japanese birthday guest, is able to communicate in multiple languages. Pretty soon he is the secretary for the terrorist group, as well as the translator between the rich Japanese businessman and the American opera star. It is a well told story.

I was surprised how much I loved "Crazy: a Novel" by William Peter Blatty. I received it as a birthday present from my brother who only bought it for the blurb on the cover by Julie Andrews, " Crazy is terrific! A  wonderful novel! It's funny, touching and so full of love!" I agree. Joey El Bueno starts his tale in NYC 1941 when he is thirteen. He meets Jane, an eighth grader, who is in and out of his life mysteriously. She tells him after spending the day with him, "That is okay to love me. But don't be in love with me. Okay? And be good to your father. He loves you so much." and then she is out of his life and he can't find her." What a mystery she was: plucky as short, fat Tony Galento getting hammered in the ring by Joe Louis, and jumpy as fleas who've just gotten great news; dropping the F-bomb and then teaching me to pray; making sense, then being totally wingy." Read the story of Joey El Bueno and be touched, despite Blattty's long run-on sentences, which I just had to mark up in my book for effect until I got hooked on the story. Wow is all I can say.

My Year With Eleanor by Noelle Hancock

http://noellehancock.blogspot.com/

This is a great book. I loved it! Yes, I have fear, fear of everything. Even when I conquer one fear, it will still haunt me again and again. The only fear I overcame was public speaking, forced to do it at my job as an adult librarian. Who knew how much public speaking there would be for someone who lists reading as her favorite activity? When Noelle Hancock loses her job as a blog writer she finds Eleanor Roosevelt to inspite her to " Do one thing every day that scares you." Living in New York City she finds lots to do that is scary, ie. first she signs up for trapeze lessons on a roof top in NYC, (luckily she convinces her friends to do it with her!) She and her friends also go sky-diving for the first time, then she learns to pilot a fighter plane that chases another newbie in a dog fight! Then her father's friend suggests climbing Mt. Kilimanjaro, Africa's highest point and the world's highest free-standing mountain, which is actually a volcano that is showing signs of renewed activity! Now that is scary! Interspersed in her narrative about her friends, her boyfriend, and her therapist are stories about Eleanor Roosevelt learning to overcome her fears. Mrs. Roosevlt really does some incedible things herself, like flying in a plane so prone to ignite the government feels it is too risky for President Roosevlt to fly in, so they allocate it to her. Another quote I like from Eleanor Roosevelt, " No one ever lives up to the best in themselves all the time, and nearly all of us love people because of their weaknesses rather than because of their strengths." 

The Ghost Writer by Philip Roth

Philip Roth

Philip Roth’s book, “The Ghost Writer,” leaves one feeling that the book should be discussed in an American Literature class. There is so much to discuss. It needs to be analyzed in detail –all the clever lines need to be underlined and studied. I haven’t read Philip Roth for some time, but reading this makes me want to change all that. This book was recommended for December reading in “ A Reader’s Book of Days” by Tom Nissley. “The Ghost Writer” was published in 1979, twenty years after his famous first novel, “Goodbye, Columbus.” I love to read books with a winter setting during the snow-filled days. The opening line of the book is, “It was the last daylight hour of a December afternoon more than twenty years ago….” A young twenty three year old published writer has been invited to the home in upper New York of his idolized writer of Jewish extraction who is fifty-six years old. This older gentleman is very self-effacing as he gains the attention of the younger generation. What draws out in the next twelve or more hours is the adoration of the twenty three year old writer looking for a father figure to understand and appreciate his art as a Jewish writer. The introduction of the famous author’s wife and a young refugee from Europe act out a drama that the writer begins a fantasy and imaginational dream about that validates him as a loyal Jew.

To The Letter by Simon Garfield

Twelve Years a Slave by Solomon Northup

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twelve_Years_a_Slave I just finished reading the book that was published in 1853 by Solomon Northup. It was hard to read of his misfortune and the hardships that he suffered at the hands of the slave owner in his last years on a cotton platation. I can't imagine not being able to write a letter to my loved ones, and especially loosing my name. Everytime the slave is sold he is known by his master's last name. After years of suffering and hopelessness he finds a carpenter from Canada who will write his letter and post it for him and the process begins from New York that had a law on their books since 1840 that no free black man could be sold. Money is taken from the state to send a representative to Louisana to bring him back home safely. Alas he tells of many slaves who have faced imprisonment since infancy and have no hope. The tearing apart of the children from their parents is the most hearbreaking, usually because there is little sympathy for their fellow man. I don't think I could watch the movie that was made this year for the suffering and violence that would be depicted..

Elizabeth George

El;izabeth George