A Word About Awards

JOHN HENRY DAYS by Colson Whitehead Nominations: Dublin Longlist 2003, LA Times Finalist 2001, National Book Critics Circle Finalist 2001, NY Times Finalist 2001, Pulitzer Finalist 2002   Date Read: November 29, 2020   Through multiple perspectives, Whitehead delves into the fact that all history is subjective. By telling the story of John Henry through varying times and attitudes, the reader gains glimpses of the legend of John Henry in anecdotes, songs, oral history and imagination. Only through these shifting aspects does the John Henry myth become a living, breathing slice of truth.   J. Sutter, whose first name we never know, lives a nomadic lifestyle as a junketeer – a rare breed of journalist that hops from one event to the next, selling the write-ups of these events to various newspapers, magazines and online publications. Sutter’s fellow junketeers are loud, obnoxious and somewhat slovenly. Their common bond is the uniqueness of their occupation as they stumble across the U.S.

OFFSHORE by Penelope Fitzgerald   Award: Booker Winner 1979   Date Read: November 27, 2020   Offshore is a brief glimpse into a community of houseboats that are moored on the Thames. While surrounded by greater London, these boats are a microcosm of the dramas and challenges happening all around them. As the name implies, the characters presented here, particularly Nenna, Richard, Maurice and Willis are in some way distant and offshore from their lives and relationships.   This entire novella metaphorically mirrors the unreachability of these characters. Nenna is living alone with her two daughters, while she waits for her husband Edward to have a change of heart and join her on the houseboat she purchased without his input. Edward, for his part, is waiting for Nenna to come to her senses and join him on dry land. In the end, it appears Edward is willing to make a compromise but that conclusion is left dangling.   Perhaps more interesting is how the dwellers of these houseboats like to

KATE VAIDEN by Reynolds Price   Award: National Book Critics Circle Winner 1986   Date Read: November 25, 2020   Kate, inarguably, has been dealt a heavy hand. Having lost her parents at a young age in a tragic murder/suicide, Kate is adrift in her life. She is welcomed into the arms of her aunt and uncle who care for her deeply and tend to her every need, however, Kate, like all of her relationships to come, never fully lets them into her heart.   At the tender age of 12, Kate becomes sexually involved with a local boy, Gaston, and flaunts all the societal mores of the 1940s south. Perhaps of all her relationships, Gaston is the one person she continues to pine for long after his death at training camp removes him permanently from her life.   These early and deep losses form the subconscious mantra that rules the rest of her life: Leave those who love you before they have a chance to leave you. For every relationship to come, Kate exits just when people feel that they have drawn close

COLD MOUNTAIN by Charles Frazier   Award: National Book Winner 1997   Nominations: Dublin Longlist 1999, National Book Critics Circle Finalist 1997   Date Read: November 21, 2020   Cold Mountain is essentially Homer’s Odyssey remade as a soldier’s long quest home after being injured in the Civil War. Throughout unimaginable injuries, escapes, near death, starving and weary, Inman makes his way homeward, his love for Ada sustaining him along the way. He meets people along the way both warm-hearted and some ill intended. His very survival is predicated on his determination, skill and heaping amount of luck.   During Inman’s journey, Ada, a once privileged princess with no workable skills to keep herself fed and the farm she inherits producing, is blessed by Ruby’s appearance in her life. Ruby is a neighbor who lives alone, her father having disappeared forever and again. Ruby has the skills Ada lacks and through their determination and grit are able to begin amassing the food they will n

THE NICKEL BOYS by Colson Whitehead   Awards: Kirkus Winner 2019, Pulitzer Winner 2020   Nominations: Aspen Words Longlist 2020, Carnegie Longlist 2020, Dayton Literary Peace Finalist 2020, Dublin Finalist 2021, Goodreads Finalist 2019, LA Times Finalist 2019, National Book Longlist 2019, National Book Critics Circle Finalist 2019, Rathbones Folio Longlist 2020   Date Read: November 14, 2020   I would love to say that Nickel Boys is heartbreaking, which it indeed is, but brutal seems a more appropriate word. This latest from Whitehead follows the boys of a reform school in Florida and the ways in which they coped with and survived the violent, sadistic and impossible environment they were thrust into.   Elwood is a smart kid with a bright future. In his 15 brief years he proves himself to be trustworthy, intellectually curious and ambitious. His one fatal flaw, however, is that his skin has more melanin. In other words, Elwood is black. I still cannot understand how a skin pigment can

LESS by Andrew Sean Greer   Award: Pulitzer Winner 2018   Nomination: Carnegie Longlist 2018   Date Read: November 12, 2020   Billed as an entertaining and satirical novel, I was not prepared for how beautiful and heartbreaking this novel was. In a masterful attempt at distracting his true heart, Arthur Less embarks on a world trip where small and large challenges await. He is confronted with his shortcomings (his rejected novel), aging (he turns 50) and, of course, denying the man who he loves and who loves him in return.   Hitting most of the hallmarks of gay culture, including wardrobe choices (his beautiful blue suit with pink lining that I could picture in my head), cheating, and the insularity of the San Francisco gay community, including the Russian River where my family has spent considerable time and I always marvel at the seamless mingling between local toughs and the gay community.   In the end, the heart wants what it wants and the ending did not leave me disappointed but h

MANY MANSIONS by Isabel Bolton   Nomination: National Book Finalist 1953   Date Read: November 7, 2020   We meet Margaret Sylvester as an aged woman, living in a rented room and reflecting on the life she has lived. For the times, she broke so many conventions – having a child out of wedlock which she was not allowed to keep, working for unions and worker justice, never marrying or raising children.   People pass through her memory and she assesses the relationships that have sustained her throughout her life. She reflects on the home she purchased on her own and the pear tree in her garden that she cherished. She lived through two world wars and changing social mores.    Margaret put herself to the task of writing a memoir and she refers back to this unread manuscript and holds dear the memories it evokes. Regardless, she determines that it should be destroyed but life, or rather, death intervene.   I found the writing beautiful but I am unclear on whether I gained anything by having

WAR TRASH by Ha Jin   Award: PEN/Faulkner Winner 2005   Nomination: Pulitzer Finalist 2005   Date Read: November 3, 2004   Because of the title, I of course expected this to be a war novel, which I generally do not like. But having recently read The Narrow Road To The Deep North and enjoying that novel, I had hoped to enjoy this one as well. Alas, it was not to be.   War Trash is a rather tedious fight over Chinese POWs during the Korean War. The war captives are in the impossible position of deciding their own fate once released from Korean prisoner camps. If they choose the Nationalists, prisoners will be sent to Taiwan to start a new life. If they choose, the Communists, prisoners will be sent back to mainland China to be reunited with their families, although they will forever bear the label of cowards because they did not die for their country but had the audacity to allow themselves to be captured.   All of these prisoners experience abuse so continual that it didn’t register com