Canada Also Reads Me!

Notice the 2nd book in the 2nd row? Guess who'll be defending it in the very first Canada Also Reads, the National Post's alternative book bash!

I'm more than a little nervous about doing Steve Zipp's Yellowknife justice, and I have a few logistics to work out (I'm flying to Japan the same day that they're having the live discussion), but overall I'm extremely excited and pumped to have this opportunity.

The Great Wednesday Compare #5- Joseph Boyden VERSUS Louisa May Alcott

The final winner of last week's Great Wednesday Compare (Joseph Boyden Vs David Adams Richards), with a final score of 5-4, was Joseph Boyden!

What an interesting vote last week. Never has it alternated back and forth as much. One vote Boyden, one vote Richards, one vote Boyden, and so on, coming down to a 4-4 tie. But as always in the case of a tie, I get to decide the winner (it is my blog afterall). It's probably no surprise that I'm going with Boyden. I really enjoyed Three Day Road, and when I met him in person, he turned out to be supremely warm and modest and funny. Granted, Richards might be those things too, but alas, our paths have never crossed. You may be asking who cares what he's like as long as he's a better writer, but I've only read one of his books, the nonfiction Hockey Dreams, and wasn't overly impressed. So book for book, I'd still pick Boyden.

This week's newest contender is probably coming out of left field.

Remember, vote simply by adding your comment below, base it on whatever merit you choose, voting does not end until Tuesday at 11:59 p.m. (Feb 16, 2010), and if you want your book to get more votes, feel free to promote them here or on your blog!

Who is better?

Joseph Boyden or David Adams Richards

Reader's Diary #577- Roald Dahl and illustrated by Quentin Blake: The BFG

Our third Dahl book together and my daughter and I are now die-hard fans. James and the Giant Peach, Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, and now the BFG, or as my daughter calls it, my BFF the BFG.

I'm still not sure I could yet declare a favourite Dahl, but I definitely enjoyed parts of this one more than the others, and definitely enjoyed parts less.

For pure silliness, the BFG wins hands down. It's impossible not to be amused by the Big Friendly Giant's speech patterns and mispronounced words:

They would be putting me into a zoo or the bunkumhouse with all those squiggling hippodumplings and crocadowndillies.

(Read it with a bad Cockney accent for extra effect.)

The plot, involving a crew of grotesque giants who steal kids from their beds at night and eat them*, needs ample doses of comedy to offset such violence and Dahl delivers.

But perhaps too well. I suspect that Dahl got a little carried away. Just like with the Bridge to Terabithia which I read recently, it takes about 100 pages or so for the story to go anywhere. Granted, the giants and their lifestyle are wildly interesting, but there's too much sacrificed for all this info and fart jokes and dream sequences. Most notably and regrettably, we never learn much about the BFG's captive, a little girl named Sophie. Without her, there would be no story, yet Dahl has shone almost all his light on the BFG. Does Sophie care that she's been snatched from her home? Is it supposed to go without saying that since she's an orphan, that no, she probably doesn't care? Willie Wonka and Charlie at least got equal air time. Sophie needs a new agent.

But for sheer amusing entertainment, the BFG was a wonderfully fun read.

One question: Do you like Quentin Blake's illustrations? I've never said much about them, because I'm not sure how I feel. They aren't really my taste, but I appreciate they have a distinct style. Still, I'd like to see someone else have a go at one.

*Oddly, this is my second book about a child-eating giant this year.

Reader's Diary #576- Nathaniel Hawthorne: The Ambitious Guest

Nathaniel Hawthorne's "The Ambitious Guest." The story opens with a quaint little scene of a family sitting around a fire. The mother and father's faces reflected gladness, the children laughed, the eldest daughter was the image of Happiness, and the grandmother, the image of Happiness grown old. Ahhh. Let's all get cozy in the cottage, shall we? Not so fast. This cottage is in a cold spot and a dangerous one; for a mountain towered above their heads, so steep, that the stones would often rumble down its sides and startle them at midnight.

Foreshadowing right from the get go is a risky business. I mean, readers haven't had much of an emotional attachment as of yet, so why should we care when they inevitably meet their demise? Because we're human and caring for our fellow human beings is what we do.

Wrong. I think what Hawthorne has done is exposed our sadistic side. What an idyllic setting Hawthorne has created. Yet it's the promise of its destruction that keeps us reading. Perhaps this is why Hawthorne doesn't personalize the characters too deeply, we might up caring too much. Keeping them 2 dimensional surely makes our sinister thoughts more palatable.

Is Hawthorne pointing his finger at us for this attitude? I should hope not. I think Hawthorne himself shows even less restraint with the rest of the story. If killing off the happy family is our focus, Hawthorne isn't content to leave it at that. With the introduction of a traveling stranger who hopes to make a name for himself before he dies, Hawthorne ups the ante. Thinking of Hawthorne's cruel treatment of these characters, I felt better about my own.

Many readers will see this tale as a story about the folly of worldly ambition, but I found the set up, and Hawthorne's omnipresence, to be much more interesting. We often get to see writer as creator but it's far less common to see writer as destroyer, at least this unabashed.

(Did you write a post for Short Story Monday? If so, please leave a link in the comments below.)

Guest Post- Debbie Mutford and 3 More Canadian Book Challenge Reviews

I think I may, for the first time, succeed in meeting the challenge of reading thirteen books by July 1st! In addition to other posts, I have three more reviews to add.

1. The Bishop's Man by Linden MacIntyre - Admittedly, I have been sitting on this book for several months. Although fictional, its controversial issues have found their way in Canadian headlines repeatedly throughout the years. I like how much MacIntyre leaves to the reader. The emotions are what run the story, not explicit details.




2. Raven, Stay By Me by Luise Van Keuren - A novel for children, Raven, Stay By Me is an introductory story of ignorance and prejudice. Inga is separated from her family in Greenland when their ship is wrecked in a storm. She finds herself adopted by the Inuit inhabitants of Newfoundland and Labrador and later in a position of needing to choose from the two cultures afraid of each other due to lack of knowledge and understanding. For a children's book, it was pretty good.



3. The Book of Negroes by Lawrence Hill - I saved the best for last. Love this book, loved it, loved it, loved it. I was at risk of disappointment as all I had heard were great reviews (there's nowhere to go but down) but Hill pulled through. This book deserves all the praise it's received over the years. I won't get into details...just read it if you haven't yet.

Saturday Word Play- C is for Crappy Clues

It's a doozy this week. Mainly because the clues are so crappy. But more on that later. In the meantime, this week's quiz is devoted to Sue Grafton. You know, the mystery author behind the whole alphabet series, A is For... set of novels. I've never read one, but I admire the dedication to a theme. If you're going to be the sort of author to pump out 26 books (she's made it to U so far), you might as well be creative... or not creative; depends on how you look at it, I guess. It certainly doesn't help her defend against those that accuse her of being formulaic.

Anyway, I'll give you the first letter of each title, but you need to figure out the rest of the missing word, based on the crappy clues. Why are they so crappy? Because they're terribly ambiguous. There are several possible answers for each one. Guess the correct ones and the beginning letters will spell out the answer. Here's an example:

L is for
Three letter body part
Day of the week
Three's Company Character (first name)
Canadian capital city (province/territory)
Day of the Week
Twelve Days of Christmas bird

With good guessing and a little logic (you know R is not likely to follow the first L), you could work the clues out as L (given), Arm, Wednesday, Larry, Edmonton, Sunday, Swan = Lawless.

A quick tip: None of the answers have been used more than once, so pay attention to those that have been answered already (including those used in the example above). It'll help narrow things down.

Feel free to do all ten at home, but only answer one in the comment section. That way, nine others will have a chance to play along.

1. U is for
Noble gas
Playing card suit
Three letter body part
Rainbow colour
Three's Company Character (first name)
Rainbow colour
Canadian capital city (province/territory)

2. I is for
Coin (Canada)
Cardinal direction
Chinese zodiac animal
Three's Company Character (first name)
Three letter body part
Titular Dickens character (first name)
Five Alive citrus fruit

3. A is for
Five Alive citrus fruit
G7 Country
Rainbow colour
Rainbow colour

4. T is for
Original Six NHL team
Triangle classification (by relative length of sides)
Canadian capital city (province/territory)
Twelve Days of Christmas bird
One of the Bronte sisters (1st name)
Day of the week
Rat Pack member (1st name)

5. Q is for
G7 Country
Noble gas
Noble gas
Three letter body part
Rainbow colour

6. R is for
Triangle classification (by relative length of sides)
Three's Company Character (first name)
Titular Dickens character (first name)
Twelve Days of Christmas bird
Three's Company Character (first name)
Solar system planet
Day of the week

7. N is for
One of the Wright brothers
Country bordering Saudi Arabia
Three's Company Character (first name)
One of the Bronte sisters (first name)

8. J is for
G7 Country
Rat Pack member (1st name)
Rainbow colour
Day of the week
Cardinal direction
Solar system planet
Twelve Days of Christmas bird

9. F is for
Solar system planet
Five Alive citrus fruit
Part of Freud psyche
Day of the week
Country bordering Saudi Arabia
Rainbow colour
Book of the Bible named after a woman

10. P is for
part of Freud psyche
Three's Company Character (first name)
Canadian capital city (province/territory)
Five Alive citrus fruit

Reader's Diary #575- Lesley Choyce: Beautiful Sadness

"Or would his olive branch be torn apart by woodpeckers of mistrust?"

That's a question asked in the classic Simpsons episode, Behind the Laughter. I thought it was funny at the time and it sticks with me as an example of... of... I'm not sure what. But I still find it funny. In the Wikipedia article on the episode, the author refers to the line as part of a "hilarious series of nonsensical metaphors." But it's not nonsensical, is it? The olive branch (a clichéd symbol for peace) is destroyed and woodpeckers peck at trees, so technically it makes sense. Is it that an attempt at creating a cliché is funny in itself?

I ask because Lesley Choyce's Beautiful Sadness is full of woodpecker lines. I dogeared every page that had such a line and there wound up to be many corners of distraction. I just wish I had a name for this kind of cheese:

1. dreams are swept with moody brooms

2. driving station wagons of dissatisfaction

3. drain acid from the battery of my will

4. inside the garden of my heart

5. because black and white are cousins of the same autopsy

6. a tie clip pinching threads of order

The unfortunate thing is that I don't think Choyce wrote these with humorous intent. Certainly the rest of the poems containing one of these woodpecker lines (hey, I think I've found my term), usually weren't funny overall. Obviously such lines took away from my enjoyment.

However, and fortunately, all was not lost. I was hopelessly caught up in Choyce's sense of rhythm and when he was descriptive, he was beautifully descriptive. When he wasn't inadvertently cheesy, I quite enjoyed the poetic elements and word play.

I tried to find my favourite, "Newfoundland Kitchen" online to share, but was unable. However, I can't help but share the last four lines:

as you let the accordion roar
here in a room enameled to lightning gloss
and insulated from the dissonance
of the present.

One of the poems from Beautiful Sadness that I could find in its entirety online was "My Father, Shaking Pepper." I thought it was fitting given yesterday's discussion of family dinners.

My Father, Shaking Pepper

It was his only vice, I think
for wars were waged at dinnertime.
My mother, silent, all of salt,
would watch his waving wrists with frowns,
his grip around the grey-white glass,
his mind intent on holding ground.

Read the rest here.

Reader's Diary #574- Scott Huler: Defining the Wind

As a child, I was fortunate enough to have a family that still sat down for meals together. It was nice. We'd squabble, pass the potatoes, squabble, talk about our respective days, squabble, and laugh. Depending on how early mom had supper on the table we'd get a good half an hour to an hour of quality family time. However, before long our near Latter Days Saints moment would be interrupted by by dad's mad scramble to turn on the radio that was perched on the ledge of the china cabinet. It was time for the Fisherman's Broadcast. It began with a tell-tale bombastic string number (up there with the original Hockey Night in Canada theme song in many Newfoundlanders' memories) and about halfway through the program a foghorn would announce the marine weather forecast. The rest of us carried on talking, but conversation with my dad at those moments consisted of a few grunts, a few shhhs, and a few blank stares. My dad spent a lot of time on the water. This was his life.

I was reminded of that program, specifically the marine weather report part, when reading Scott Huler's Defining the Wind (especially in his mention of an English radio program known as The Shipping Forecast). It was a nice memory, but it also served as a great reminder that for some folks, the weather means much more than an occasional minor inconvenience.

One of those folks, Francis Beaufort, is the subject of Huler's book and clearly the author's obsession. Apparently Huler was flipping through a dictionary one day when he came upon something called the Beaufort Scale. A descriptive scale of wind speeds, to Huler it was poetry. For the life of me, I cannot see poetry in this scale. I see a practicality in the scale, I see conciseness in the scale, and with Huler's help I was even able to see rhythmic meter in the scale. But Huler saw poetry and became obsessed, not only with the scale, but the man it was named after.

It's that obsession that both drives the book and makes Huler himself a central character. Early on in his research, Huler discovers that Beaufort didn't really have much of a hand in the scale's creation. An admiral who was in love with observation and detail, Beaufort was simply attracted to the work of others who had devised descriptive wind scales. He compiled their work, helped standardize it, and certainly promoted its use but really shouldn't be credited with its creation. In my opinion, the most practical application of the scale, didn't even appear in Beaufort's lifetime. It wasn't until a German sailor named P. Petersen developed an add-on, the state of the sea scale, that the scale became really useful out at sea, for people who still use the scale today. But despite uncovering these truths about Beaufort, Huler continued to proceed with his book, continued to cast Beaufort as the ideal observer, the representative eighteenth century man, a man who saw potential scientists in everyone as long as they had a sharp eye and a knack for innovation.

Fine, so Huler refuses to give up on his hero. That's not the problem. The real issue comes from his insistence on making Beaufort great by association. In his research on Beaufort, Huler finds it remarkable that he stumbles upon the lives of Charles Darwin, Daniel Defoe, James Cook and others. He also goes into needless detail about sailing, windmills, kites, hurricanes scales, British radio shows, and so on. If you've ever been quoted about the wind, there's a chance you're in this book. At one point Huler writes,

There was something about describing the wind that sparked expressive language and I think the answer is that the wind is invisible. You can’t describe it because you can’t see it. You can only describe what it does to things you can see - sails, the sea, trees, roof tiles. To describe clouds, trees, or anything else, you focus in on that specific thing, ignoring everything else. To describe the wind, you do the opposite: you look at everything else. It’s mind expanding.

I read another review that almost convincingly tries to use this statement to justify Huler's many meanderings. To understand Beaufort, he argues, you must also look at everything else.

Except Beaufort wasn't the wind, he wasn't invisible. That approach is stupid. Huler's book comes off as someone who set out to write a book on the inventor of the Beaufort Scale, realized very quickly that it wasn't Beaufort (besides, Beaufort's already been the subject of a couple of biographies), but decided to fill a couple hundred pages anyway. Let's say I had a silver spoon in my drawer that had been passed down to me as having once belonged to Napolean Bonaparte. Fascinating. So I go to write a book about it but with minimal research discover that the spoon was really just a stainless steel spoon purchased by my grandfather at Eatons 50 years ago. I scrap the book idea, right? Wrong. I get the truth out of the way in the first chapter, then proceed to write a bit about Napolean, a bit about how stainless steel is made, Eatons catalogues, my grandfather and maybe forks while I'm at it. All the while, I'm still convinced this spoon remains the single most fascinating piece of cutlery in the history of the world. What an unnecessary piece of writing.

The only thing that kept me going was the marvel of Huler's bizarre insistence. I wanted desperately to discover the psychology of the author. Alas, I never came up with anything more than someone refusing to admit he's wasted his time and now ours. Pride? Is that it?