A Word About Awards

HELIGOLAND by Shena Mackay   Nominations: Booker Longlist 2003, Women's Prize Finalist 2003   Date Read: September 28, 2021   This may be the place where a building, the Nautilus, is as much a character here as the remaining residents. Rowena, a twice-over orphan from India but raised in England, has just moved into the Nautilus. The building, once a thriving community of artists and eccentrics, has fallen into disrepair and the tenants have dwindled down to just three. With Rowena moving in the population has swelled to four.   The Nautilus sounds like a bizarre building. Based on a shell, the flow of the rooms move in a swirl until the center where a vast circular library can be found. There once was a communal dining room and a bar, closed due to some misbehaving former residents.    Rowena, however, has never found her tribe. She has drifted through her life and doesn’t have much to show for it. She has no family, including adoptive family. She has had brief affairs but nothing

FIRE FROM HEAVEN by Mary Renault   Nomination: Booker Finalist 1970   Date Read: September 25, 2021   For readers that are really into war novels, this would definitely be their jam. Mine? Not so much. This is almost like Hilary Mantel meets Michael Shaara. While truly gifted at her art, the subject matter is just not for me.   Alexander, son of King Phillip, is a willful child just coming into his own. Beloved by his mother, who King Philip loathes, Alexander is eager for his first kill in battle, which he achieves by the age of 16. Being a willful child, however, means that he often crosses his father, even going to far as to almost fight his father at his father’s wedding to a 15 year old girl (ew!). I guess you could have more than one wife in those times.   Knowing that crossing the King like that put both his life and the life of his mother, Olympias, in danger, he gathers the men loyal to Alexander and his mother and flees back to her hometown. And there Alexander remains until

BY THE SEA by Abdulrazak Gurnah   Award: Nobel Prize Winner 2001 Nominations: Booker Longlist 2001, LA Times Finalist 2001   Date Read: September 24, 2021   By The Sea is so well written that for me the story was almost a side-note. Gurnah has a way with language that makes me appreciate English in an entirely new way.   Latif and Saleh are refugees from Zanzibar, now living in a quiet and drab part of England. These two were enemies in their native country but now, having reunited so far from home and able to share their perspectives of the drama that has unfolded over the years between their families, a tentative friendship is formed to the surprise of them both.   Upon first seeking asylum, Saleh claims to not speak English and arrives under the assumed name Rajab Shabaan, the name of Latif’s deceased father. With not much to do as an older refugee, Saleh wanders through the local furniture stores, which remind him of his successful furniture shop in his home country.    Latif blame

SWAN SONG by Kelleigh Greenberg-Jephcott   Nomination: Orange Longlist 2019   Date Read: September 20, 2021   I have to admit that I was drawn to this book because of the beautiful cover (yes, I am that shallow) and because of the fallout over broken trust. I also knew that that broken trust was something Capote never quite overcame. Using his circle of friends as fodder for a novel seemed like laziness and betrayal, honestly. I think only after he published the article in Esquire did he come to realize that too.   As privileged and elite as this parade of characters is, they lack some of the fundamental, life-sustaining authenticity such as purpose, true connection and true love. They are able to indulge in purchasing whims and luxurious vacations to enviable locations but there is something vacant about their existence. I wouldn’t trade places with any of them for a minute.   My heart really went out to Tru, who with a child-like countenance still cannot grasp how hurtful his violati

WHITE NOISE by Don DeLillo   Award: National Book Winner 1985   Nomination: National Book Critics Circle Finalist 1985   Dates Read: February 11, 2005 & September 15, 2021   Jack Gladney, the founder of Hitler studies at an unnamed college in the U.S., is in a blended family and feeling content. Kids from his previous marriages and his current-wife’s previous marriages swirl around them in chaos, plus one wee they share between them. In the midst of all this noise and animation, Jack and Babette seem happy.   The one haunting fear for them both is death. While death is a common fear among all humans, death is particularly haunting to both Jack and Babette. They have countless conversations about who should die first. Or who they hope will die first. But what Jack doesn’t realize is that Babette’s fear is so profound that she answered a questionable add in a tabloid to participate in a study about the fear of death. She even went so far as to take an unapproved drug and sleep with t

THE GATHERING DARKNESS by Thomas Gallagher   Nomination: National Book Finalist 1953   Date Read: September 14, 2021   The McPeek family, solidly middle-class with excellent future prospects due to shrewd stock-market investments, live a somewhat idyllic life with an apartment in New York and summers spent at the shore. Peg, their firstborn, although not John’s biological daughter, has just recovered from a long quarantine from scarlet fever. Sheila, not allowed to be with her sister during this time, is at the shore with her father, soaking up his undivided attention.   Sheila isn’t just a bitch, she’s absurdly cruel. A lack of her mother’s affection doesn’t necessarily warrant the absolutely abhorrent behavior she shows her family. She seems to thrive off the misery she causes, which in my book, makes her a sociopath. Having to beg her to be good on Peg’s engagement night just shows how much she is holding her family hostage to her spiteful behavior.   After a while, though, reading

SHUGGIE BAIN by Douglas Stuart   Award: Booker Winner 2020   Nominations: Carnegie Longlist 2021, Kirkus Finalist 2020, LA Times Finalist 2020, National Book Finalist 2020, National Book Critics Circle Finalist 2020, PEN/Hemingway Finalist 2021   Date Read: September 11, 2021   Shuggie Bain is a heartbreaking novel about a child growing up in Scotland with a raging alcoholic as a mother. Shuggie’s father is long-gone and there is no one really to rescue him from the daily uncertainties an alcoholic can create, including his two siblings. Caroline has fled through marriage to South Africa. Leek was thrown out of the house in one of Agnes’ drunken rages, leaving Shuggie to care for his mother and take on tasks far above his years. In fact, Shuggie never had a childhood. All his years, his mother has come first.   Shuggie’s problems are exacerbated by the fact that his demeanor is effeminate, in stark contrast to the Scottish machismo that is expected and considered “the norm.” Fortunatel

THE WHITE TIGER by Aravind Adiga   Award: Booker Winner 2008   Dates Read: July 14, 2010 & September 7, 2021   What readers can learn from this novel is that the level of corruption in India is staggering and there’s not much people wouldn’t do to get ahead. One example: The village school teacher steals their lunch and uniform money but perceived by the kids as justified since he hadn’t been paid in 6 months. India seems like a country where all the morals and values the West believes in go completely out the window. I know that’s a gross generalization but you have to believe that most of the shenanigans described in The White Tiger actually happen.   Everyone is so focused on survival that there is no time to consider kindness, or to contemplate if one is being a good person. Everyone’s nose is so pushed to the grindstone, not much else matters. The bus driver from Balram’s village is envied for his uniform, whistle, and regular paycheck. The kids in the village aspire to be him

THE MORNING WATCH by James Agee   Nomination: National Book Award Finalist 1952   Date Read: September 5, 2021   I have never understood why humans believe devotion to God requires suffering and deprivation. I don’t believe this is God’s intention for us. And to read about kids of 12 believing they need to suffer for God’s favor is heart-wrenching.   During prayer, Richard realizes that an entire half hour has gone by while his mind wandered and was absorbed with other things than his own salvation. As a mother to a twelve-year-old, the discipline with which this child lives his life is astounding. My son could never sit still, focus on his own sainthood and attempt to reach Christ through prayer. The level of focus and dedication this requires slays me; while at the same time, I realize how undisciplined we all are in modern times. Then again, I don’t want my son focusing his time on trying to appease a God whose mind we can never begin to comprehend.    Also incredible is the timelin

SNOW FALLING ON CEDARS by David Guterson   Award: PEN/Faulkner Winner 1995   Date Read: September 3, 2021   I remember long ago watching the film they made of this book and being mesmerized. The book is just as beautiful and since I don’t remember the film all that well, even better. Guterson is able to captivate all your senses from the snow softly falling, to the smell of wet cedar, to the mist that surrounds their island, to the taste of ripened strawberries. All of this adds up to perfection.   Ishmael and Hatsue unexpectedly and scandalously fall in love just before the beginning of WWII. Ishmael knows better than to associate with a Japanese girl and vice versa. The Japanese in the U.S. are notoriously deprived of rights (e.g. not able to own land, to vote, to marry anyone other than a Japanese, etc.) and their situation is made all the more precarious once Pearl Harbor is bombed. From there, Hatsue’s life goes from bad to worse.   Although they are forced to say goodbye, Ishmael

AFFLICTION by Russell Banks   Nomination: PEN/Faulkner Finalist 1990   Date Read: September 4, 2021   Told from the perspective of his brother, Affliction follows the downward spiral of Wade Whitehouse. While Wade has never had his shit fully together, he quickly becomes undone by a local deer hunting shooting. The incident is considered an accident but Wade is hell-bent on investigating it as a homicide.   Wade’s life has never been easy. His father is an abusive alcoholic that terrorized his three children and his wife. They live in a very small, New England town that is economically challenged. Opportunities to rise above one’s circumstances are just about non-existent. Add to this a lack of education, marrying the same woman twice and being the father to a daughter that really doesn’t like Wade and you can see that Wade’s life is depressing.   When we meet Wade, he is occasionally boinking Margie, a kind woman who give him more compassion than he probably deserves. After Wade’s mot