A Favorite Classic

Over at The Classics Club blog (which is an outgrowth of Jillian's Classics Club idea and project), there is a monthly discussion question related, of course, to classic literature. This month the participants are asked:

What is your favorite classic book? Why?

I may have mentioned before that I hate choosing favorites. And a favorite classic? That's made even more difficult because I tend to further subdivide "classics" into other, more manageable categories - English, American, modern, ancient, world lit - how to choose?

So my choice is more like "a" favorite classic. And I'm going with Joseph Heller's Catch-22.

It was one of four books I had to read the summer before 11th grade AP English. It was the first book that I remember really struggling with - what was all this nonsense going on? I don't get it! Them, at some point, it just clicked, and I was in love. I felt like I was let in on a little secret, one that you had to work for. That was the first time that happened with a book, but not the last. Others since then have been Faulkner's As I Lay Dying and One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez.

What books have made you feel that way? 

The Dovekeepers

The Dovekeepers
Alice Hoffman

From the first, it's apparent that Alice Hoffman has spent time researching this book. She attempts to bring to life the time of Jewish resistance to Roman rule in the first century CE, culminating with the siege on Masada.

She focuses on the women in the community, handpicked by Shirah, the Witch of Moab, to tend the fortress's doves. Four of the women narrate sections of the novel. Unfortunately, they all sound the same. I love a book that successfully handles multiple narrators, but here it just doesn't work. A third person narration, with a focus on the four women in turn, probably would have been a better choice.

I did love how she presented a part of early(ish? I'm not a scholar) Judaism that has been pretty well covered up - and had all these rebellious women. I love a good rebellious woman character. Her presentation of the fortress of Masada was really interesting. I never realized it was a retreat for King Herod, and would thus have all the trappings royalty would have demanded. It was pretty cool to think about turning it into a stronghold for rebels.

On the whole, though, I didn't love the book. Much of it felt overwrought, and it dragged on and on. I mean, it's set in Masada. I know what's bound to happen, but I felt like I was reading 450 pages just to get to the action. Still, worth reading for the good parts.

Want more like this? Try:*

• Stacy Schiff, Cleopatra, A Life. While focused on Cleopatra (duh) this book offers a different perspective on her contemporary, Herod, and his desert kingdom.
• Geraldine Brooks, People of the Book. Judaism through time, as illustrated by the travels of an ancient manuscript.
• Raphael Patai, The Hebrew Goddess. I haven't read this one yet, but I am excited to learn about this aspect of Judasim. I always thought it was a monotheistic religion from its beginning. 

*All book links are to the Indiebound affiliate program.  

Sunday Salon: Fried Chicken and Books

This weekend, the hubby and I went out to dinner with another couple. They'd never been to this restaurant, but I assured them this place had some of the best chicken wings in town. (We were in that I-need-another-beer-and-some-bar-food-kinda-mood.) This got us talking about some of the places to get some really good food in town.

One of my favorite places is this cute little soul food restaurant in an area of town that's not got the best reputation. The restaurant's been there for decades, and in recent years it's gotten a facelift, along with other businesses on that block. I've never felt unsafe going there, and they have really good fried chicken, cornbread, collard greens, lima beans - all that stuff I just love. So I go there, and on many occasions I've sung it's praises to people I work with. I've managed to make a few converts ;-)

However, some people give me a hard time, look at me suspiciously, and wonder why I like to go to "the hood" to eat. I just smile and tell them I'll go wherever there's good food.

So anyway, my friend tells me that she's tried one of the fried chicken places in the neighborhood in question, and she didn't like it. I tell her I'll take her to the place I like. Then she says, with a little smirk on her face, "I think you go there to prove a point."

I gave her my usual answer. Good food rules.

But here's the thing - she's partly right. I do go there, and other places like it, and then talk about it, on purpose. I want to show people (mainly other white, middle class people like myself) that's it's really okay if they go to black owned businesses. If they let black people cook their food. That even when the young black guy at the rib place gets arrested and shows up in court for some stupid possession charge that yes, I'll still eat where he works. (Can you imagine not eating where potheads work? There's not a restaurant around not staffed by people who smoke weed.)

So what does this have to do with books?

I approach my reading in the same way. I do thoughtfully seek out books from people of color. When I like them, I sing their praises. When I'm at the salon, talking books with the manicurist, I'm sure to tell her I'm reading Their Eyes Were Watching God, and I'm enjoying it. She's never heard of it, so I tell her how it's set in Florida, it deals with the 1928 hurricane, etc. She tells me that A Land Remembered is one of her favorite books. It's also a book set in old Florida. I don't make a big deal out of the fact that Their Eyes is by a black woman. It's just a good book, plain and simple. (Well actually, it's a great book, but that's for my upcoming gushing review.)

But there are so many good books that don't get the credit they're due. Or someone reads one book by a Harlem Renaissance author back when they were in high school, didn't like it, and now doesn't ever want to tray another one.

It's like not liking the friend chicken at one restaurant and then never going to try the place next door. It's just waiting there, ready to knock your socks off.

Books links are affiliate links to Indiebound.org 

Weekend Cooking: Minding My Manners

Emily Post on Entertaining
Elizabeth L. Post

I've had this book on my shelves for ages now, and have done little more than flip through it. I'd read the first chapter. "Party Planning" and decided it was so out of the realm of anything I could see my self doing that I put it down without a second thought.

But you know what? Despite the dreadfully stuffy bits, this could actually come in handy. Not that I plan on hosting a formal six course dinner party any time soon. However, it demystifies some of the impenetrable fog of secret Greenwich WASP code that surrounds these events.

It's also got good tips on how to manage logistics of say, a beach picnic. Or a buffet lunch. It has pointers on housewarming parties vs. open houses (who knew?).

Honestly, it was almost fun to imagine myself in some of the less probable circumstances: How do I treat the servants? (politely, but not with familiarity). Can I leave before the President of the United States does? (absolutely not). Must I used engraved invitations when I have a reception for my Senator? (ha!).

Anyway, give it a try, even if it's just to remember that your water glass is the one on the right.

Weekend Cooking, hosted by Beth Fish Reads, is a weekly blogging event open to anyone with a food related post to share. Do check out what this weekend's other participants are stirring up!

Top Ten Tuesday: Picture of Me

Top Ten Tuesday is host each week by the lovely bloggers over at The Broke and the Bookish
This week's task is to pick the 

Top Ten Posts On Your Blog That Would Give The BEST Picture of YOU 

as a reader and a person

Welcome! This is where I introduce myself and my blog, so I hope it gives a pretty good picture of me. I *am* trying to get better at the book snobbery - and think I'm making progress!

Books Meet Art at the Brooklyn Museum My nerdy side reveals itself.

Books Through Bars Hey, I do criminal defense.

Audiobook Success with Toni Morrison This is what happens when I'm just in love with a book. Not must beyond YOU MUST READ THIS. READ THIS, NOW. What can I say? Words fail sometimes.

Lord Help Us What happens when I really do not like a book. Like, REALLY don't like it.

Best of 2011, Thoughts on 2012 In which I get all contemplative.

New York, New York A tribute to some of the best books featuring the Big Apple.

In Which I Discover Charlotte Perkins Gilman

Pin It, Do It, Take 1 I get crafty!

Top Ten Tuesday: Favorite Characters I feel a list a favorite characters says a lot about myself.

Some Quick Thoughts

Every Last One
Anna Quindlen

At work, we have a book exchange box. I pulled this one out of it awhile ago, as I've been wanting to give Anna Quindlen another try. I read Blessings several years ago, and thought it was okay, but nothing special. However, I've read some short nonfiction from her and really like it a lot.

Well, I think I'll stick to her nonfiction. Every Last One was... fine. Tragic, which certainly appeals to me. But there was a distance between the reader and the Mary Beth, the narrator, a buffer, that meant that I never really felt a true connection with her. She has trouble connecting with the other people in her life, too.

There is a lovely piece near the beginning where Mary Beth describes the breathing patterns of each of her children. Their sounds while sleeping mirror their personalities while awake. I am fascinated by idea of what makes a person uniquely "them," even as they sleep.

So, not a bad book, but just not worth raving about.

Miral
Rula Jebreal

This is a book that could have been really good. Hind, a young, Arab woman in Jerusalem finds 55 orphaned or abandoned children, victims of the violence erupting in the city. She changes the course of her life to serve this children and the many more like them that are sure to appear. She leverages her considerable connections to keep them housed, fed, and as safe as possible.

The book is divided into parts, each part focusing on one of the female characters. Miral, of course, is one of them, a girl sent to Hind's orphanage and school after her mother dies. Her father is at a loss as to what do do with Miral and her younger sister. He trusts Hind to look after them and educate them, and he does his best to see them as often as possible.

Unfortunately, the tone never seemed to change, so all of the women just blended together for me. Further, just like in Every Last One, there was a distance between the characters and the reader. In fact, in the first chapter, I thought perhaps I was reading a journalist telling of an event that was going to set up the "real" action of the book. Nope. And then I realized the book was written by a journalist. I have  not had much luck with journalists who write novels.

Here's a thing I like about blogging: it forces me to think about why  a book didn't speak to me. Here are two decent books, ones I'm sure many people would like, but they weren't for me. And in writing about them, I realize that despite the vastly different settings, time period, etc, the problem I had with both of them was that I could not connect with the main characters. I don't have to like the main characters of the books I read, but I do have to get them.

What is a must for you when you read? Characters? Plot? Writing? Something else? Share in the comments.

July in Review

4th of July Seattle

Wow! It seems July just absolutely flew by. I managed to complete 6 books, plus I'm about halfway through with The Dovekeepers by Alice Hoffman. So far, so good. I'm enjoying a glimpse into a much more ancient Jewish culture than I've previously read about. It really makes me want to pick up The Hebrew Goddess by Raphael Patai

6 books total
3 fiction                50%
3 nonfiction          50%
5 female authors  83%
0 translated           0%

Unbelievable. For whatever reason, this is two months in a row that I haven't read any books translated into English (does all the Olympics watching count for anything?!). I'm going to have to focus on that for August. Unfortunately, most of the books laying around, waiting for me to pick them up and read them, were written in English. I'd love any recommendations for easy to locate books in translation.  Leave any suggestions in the comments!