Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert M. Pirsig

SIGH.  Let's see.  Where to begin?  Yowsa.  This book is not for the faint of heart.  The text is extremely cerebral and gave me a splitting headache every time I picked it up.  The author's I.Q. was 170 at one time and that level of intelligence is reflected in the writing.  It took me enormous concentration to understand what was being said and I believe I am a reasonably intelligent person.  That said, I enjoyed the book and was glad that I read it.  If it had not been on the Rory Gilmore booklist I probably would never have chosen it for my A to Z Challenge.  (So thank you Gilmore Girls!) 

Through logic and reasoning, the author explains his own philosophy about Values and living a "Quality life".  He gives a history of philosophy in general from the Sophists (pre-Plato) to the present but not in a stuffy historian way.  He also briefly talks about the histories of science and knowledge as they relate to his philosophy.  He discusses mathematics and truth and eastern religions and all of this in a way so as to make it accessible to regular people (who concentrate really, REALLY hard).  :) 

From a Christian standpoint it becomes clear to me that the "Quality" which Pirsig works out for himself is God.  It is obvious and lovely.  I appreciate with what order and detail he proves through logical reasoning that this "Quality" exists.  There are many people in the world who believe that God and logical thinking are mutually exclusive and because Pirsig proves this is not so, I enjoyed reading this book very much.  Ultimately, the author's philosophy is that to change the world, we must change our hearts.  We must have "Quality" in our lives in all that we think and say and do.  When individuals achieve a "Quality" life, the world will become a better place.  What a beautiful message, no?

The book covers a two week, cross-country, motorcycle road trip the author takes with his son and the deep thinking the author does during those long stretches of open road.  Actually it is the deep thinking of his lifetime which he reflects back on during the road trip.  At the beginning of the book the author comes off sounding very intolerant and self-absorbed/arrogant.  He seems to find fault with his travelling companions and their values.  As you get further into the book it seems like the initial judgement was more a projection of what the author perceives as people's general intolerance of each other's ways of thinking and nothing like what he really thinks.  In fact, the "why can't we all just get along" question appears to be what the author sets out to solve when he comes up with his "Quality" philosophy.

I read the book in a few days and when I was finished, I wished I had taken it much more slowly.  I think it would have been easier and more meaningful if I had taken it a little at a time and been more contemplative about it.  (Also, it could have saved me some massive headaches.)  A word of warning:  Mental illness is part of the story of both father and son and is a prominent figure in the book, though not the focus.  Those that are sensitive to mental illness-related issues might find the book a little disturbing.

A real thinker, uplifting, and inspiring- not to mention a mind bender (genius-philosopher-motorcycle dude sat outside my paradigm before reading this)- Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance is something more substantial than I usually read and it made my head hurt.  A lot.

Book of a Thousand Days by Shannon Hale

I've put off getting and reading this for a couple of years.  I wish I hadn't.  Maybe I wouldn't have been so disappointed if I hadn't waited so long to read it.  The story is meticulously rendered like Hale's other fairy tales.  The details are evocative and consistent.  The setting is medieval Mongolia and she paints a believable, breathable picture.  That said, the story was just ho hum for me.  I was bored.  If you're going to read Shannon Hale I would recommend you skip this one and pick up something else she has written.  Not that this book wasn't okay.  It's just that the others are better.

A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving

Sigh.  I didn't even want to review this book after reading it.  In fact, I had decided not to but I just saw that it is one of the books on my A-Z Challenge so I felt like I should.  What to say... what to say...?  My mom recommended it.  When I mentioned to my best friend from 7th grade that I was reading it she got very enthusiastic and went on about how it is her favorite book of all time and how she regularly buys new copies since she is always giving her copies away.  SO-  some people like this book.  I guess.  I suppose they would have to for it to keep being printed and selling copies.  I am not one of those people.  Not even a little bit.  Not even just one part.  I think I'll stop there. 

Some objections:  general lack of reverence for the Divinity of Christ (Owen, we are to understand, is the result of another immaculate conception and is worshipped by the narrator after Owen's death), the politics (but if you hate Republicans it probably won't irritate the crap out of you), the language, and this quote:

"...although the subject of the president's personal (or sexual) morality would not have dampened everyone's enthusiasm for his political ideals and his political goals, Owen Meany was not "everyone"--nor was he sophisticated enough to separate public and private morality."

"...it seems that the only people who are adamant in their claim that public and private morality are inseparable are those creep-evangelists who profess to "know" that God prefers capitalists to communists, and nuclear power to long hair."

Truly there are no words.

In addition to my general objections, the pacing is too slow.  We spend hundreds of pages building up to something we're supposed to care about and by the time you get there you are so sick of waiting for the moment that the feeling is more one of "FINALLY!" instead of "Oh NO!  Poor OWEN!". 

Skip this one.  And if after reading this you really feel you must experience it, rent Simon Birch from Netflix instead.  I understand Ashley Judd is lovely as usual.

These Is My Words by Nancy E. Turner

I haven't reviewed anything in a while because I've been so busy with my kids home from school for the summer. These Is My Words was first recommended to me by my husband's aunt almost two years ago. Then this January, my sister-in-law borrowed it from the aunt and recommended it as well. I bought the book and put it on my TBR list/A~Z Challenge but had several other books ahead of it in my pile so I put it off. Last week two friends at choir practice were going on and on about it and I decided I couldn't put it off any longer. I came home and the next day I read the book. There is really only one thing I can say:


Dearest Mr. Darcy,

It pains me to have to tell you that I think we need to break up. You and I have had a good run of it and you have always meant a lot to me. I've loved you more than Edward or Jacob. I loved you more than Romeo and Petruchio. Once I had seen the A&E portrayal of you I even loved you more than Gilbert Blithe. But to go on this way would be unfair to you. I've found someone else and now that I know him, you will never again be the literary model of male perfection. I am so sorry to do this in writing but since it is where we first met, I felt it was only fitting. Please know that you will always hold a special place in my heart, but that heart now belongs to the husband of Sarah Agnes Prine.

With love,
Aberjaber

The story is based on the family memoirs of the author and takes place in the late 1800's in the Arizona Territory. It is a heart-warming (sometimes heart-wrenching) tale of a family and the struggles of frontier life. It is exciting, interesting, moving, and filling. I felt like I had a comfortable quilt wrapped around me the entire time I was reading it. Once I finished, I wanted to start at the beginning and read it again. This book is the heart of Something More Substantial.

The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle by Avi

I believe The True Confessions won the Newberry Medal in 1991. I have never felt a book more deserving of that honor. The story examines many themes. Honor, truth, justice, sacrifice, honesty, and the idea that sometimes events change us forever in ways which make it impossible to return to our former lives are a few of these. I LOVED this book. It was exciting, well-written and I couldn't put it down. I read the entire thing in half a day.

The story follows Charlotte, a thirteen year-old girl in the early 19th century, as she makes her way across the Atlantic alone to join her family in America. On the way she encounters dangers, intrigues and adventures which change her outlook on society- and herself- forever. This book is definitely Something More Substantial. READ IT!

Cry, the Beloved Country by Alan Paton

Cry, the Beloved Country is set in post-WWII South Africa during the prelude to Apartheid. The story is about (Stephen) Kumalo, a pastor who witnesses the destruction of the family, the tribe, and the land around him. As Kumalo works to put the pieces of all these things back together, he learns some of the greatest truths in the world: the more civilized we are the less civilized we become, that defending the family is essential to our success as a people, and that forgiveness- the greatest of all gifts- can bring about miracles in the unlikeliest of places.

The story is very sad for the first two-thirds of the book and you should probably skip this one if you are depressed or have a prodigal in your family. If you are fortunate enough not to be in these circumstances however, I definitely think this book is Something More Substantial. The at-times lyrical writing conveys a beautiful overall message and the ideas about family and community are worth pondering for anyone.

Winter's Tale by Mark Helprin

Wow. I finished this book a week ago and was at such a loss for what to say about it that I waited a week to write this review in hopes inspiration would come. I am still reeling, trying to construct coherent thoughts about it. Bridging seemingly incongruous ideas which verge on one another so seamlessly that I am stunned by the breathtaking efficiency and precision of it, Mark Helprin strings delicate beads of mismatched colors until suddenly you are holding a rosary of stars and have not the slightest idea with to do with it. I, like most of the other people who've read this book, have absolutely no idea what it is about. I read all 768 pages and when I finished, I had as much understanding of the book as I did the day I first heard of it. And I LOVED IT. What I have to say about it probably won't make sense, but then neither did the book. Just keep in mind that in deciding what to say about Winter's Tale I have had to scour the deepest corners of my mind to pull together language which can somehow express my thoughts about it at all.


Winter's Tale is what you would get if you poured one part each of-

Romeo and Juliet, Brigadoon, Dickens, the Gaya Hypothesis, Monet's paintings of The Houses of Parliament at Sunset, Einstein's Theory of Relativity, Norman Rockwell, Al Capone, Tennyson, the story of the Tower of Babel, Renoir's color palette, Jules Verne, the characterization of The Simpsons, Robert Frost, Rip Van Winkle, Dorothy Gale, Dowdle Folk Art, Narnia, Brahms' lullaby, Sinclair's Jungle, a fieldtrip to the planetarium and Madeline L'Engle's Wrinkle In Time series-

into a vast lakebed and then watched as the many colors twisted in and around one another until, at last, every part had become one and everything was whole, and the whole was a hole through which you could see the universe and it was beautiful. (See? I told you it wasn't going to make sense.)

For me, the book is about a lot of things. It is about juxtapositions. It is about how everything has its opposite; how justice, balance, and restitution are part of the ultimate destiny of this world and how even though they might be anwered on the tenth generation, they still come to pass. It shows that change is the only thing that stays the same. It is about how time does not exist, how Heaven does, and how Heaven cannot be barged into but may be sometimes right around us, here on this very earth and we just don't see it. It's about how we are not alone. We are all somehow connected in ways that we do not see because the magnitude of these connections is so great that they are beyond our notice at all. They are so all-encompassing that they draw the people whose lives are intertwined to specific places- junctions- over and over again. The book shows that once you are a resident of someplace wonderful, you are always a resident there; no matter where you go or how long you are away. It's about how there is a grand design in place, an enormous machine of a thing, and every person and event and location is an integral part of the plan. The machine is constantly in motion and being part of the design gives us purpose.

What I loved most about this book was that it was beautiful. I don't mean that it was all flying horses and starlit nights and scenes of folk art painted in the loveliest shades from Van Gogh's masterpieces, although those things are there too. I mean the writing is beautiful. Not in the flowery and romantic way, but beautiful in the carefully crafted, hand-carved antique jewelry box way. Every sentence so carefully constructed, every word specifically chosen. The language so smooth you want to run your hand across its face and then open it up to see all the wonderful things therein. The kind of beautiful you want to wrap around you and take a nap in on a cloudy day. Perfect in its descriptions of both beauty and horrors, in its balance between the two. Perfect in its timing- the pace seems to pick up and move along faster and faster- as if you are reading in time with a locomotive steaming down the tracks. Perfect in its Dickensesque, dizzyingly complex, interconnection of characters. Perfect in its descriptive landscapes and portraits. A perfect rendering of perfect moments.

For the sake of a thorough review, I add only that there were a couple sex scenes in the book I was a little uncomfortable with. I think I read the f-word twice. I would highly recommend this book to avid readers. It is not for someone who doesn't read much. It's not for anyone who hates New York City. Most of all, it is not for those who find the feelings of muddled and vague comprehension disconcerting or uncomfortable. For everyone else however, it is truly wonderful. I suggest that when you read it, you read it with somebody because you will wish to have someone with whom to discuss it. Don't bother with what Wikipedia has to say about it. I thought that their article was a gross misinterpretation of all the symbolism in the book. It seemed to me the author wanted to pretend he had found the secret decoder ring. I do not believe for even the smallest instant that the author of the Wikipedia article understood the book any better than every other reviewer who came straight out and said, "I have no idea what this book is about."

I give "Winter's Tale" a heartfelt Something More Substantial.

Austenland by Shannon Hale

I love this one! Austenland is a tale of a woman who can't seem to find a guy to hold on to because none of the men she meets can measure up to Jane Austen's Mr. Darcy (especially as portrayed by Colin Firth). I had a hard time getting into the book. The first couple of chapters didn't exactly grab me. I stuck with it though and I'm glad that I did. Hale does a marvelous job of capturing the flavor of Austen's writing and the essence of Mr. Darcy, all in a modern context. The ending was wonderfully unpredictable and the author manages to write the story in such a way that any of the possible opposing outcomes would be happily accepted by the reader. The book is a wonderful romp through Regency England and an interesting commentary on what life might truly have been like for young women of that period. I recommend this book to lovers of Jane Austen's works- not just Pride and Prejudice, but the rest of her novels as well, and anyone who loves seventeenth century English literature. The book makes frequent reference to Austen's novels and there are also allusions to works from other authors of the time period such as Charlotte and Emily Bronte. In spite of the slow start I give this book a hearty something more substantial.

A~Z and TBR Challenges

I heard it from a friend who

heard it from a friend who

heard it from a friend

You been mess- No wait.

I mean I heard about this challenge to read 52 books in a year, the A~Z Challenge. You choose one book title for each letter of the alphabet and one author for each letter of the alphabet. (No doubling up.) Click here for the official site, or just play along at home. My A~Z picks are toward the bottom of the page on the sidebar. If anyone knows a good book starting with the letter "X", PLEASE let me know!!! Apparently the author of the challenge didn't take the serious shortage of such titles into consideration when she launched her idea.

There is also another challenge called the TBR Challenge which you can do instead of, or combine with, the A~Z Challenge. Combining the two is the approach I have chosen. It seemed to render narrowing down the options much easier for the A~Z Challenge in my opinion. Basically, the TBR Challenge is this:

Pick 12 books - one for each month of 2008 - that you've been wanting to read (that have been on your "To Be Read" list) for 6 months or longer, but haven't gotten around to. Read one book from this list each month in 2008.

I have included my 12 in the A~Z lists. They are:

1. Austenland by Shannon Hale (A Title)


2. Breaking Dawn by Stephenie Meyer (I've been planning to read that since I finished the first three in two days last fall) (B Title)


3. Crime and Punishment by Dostoevsky (C Title)


4. David Copperfield by Charles Dickens (D Title)


5. Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams (H Title)


6. Standing For Something by Gordon B. Hinckley (S Title)


7. The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle by Avi (T Title)


8. Winter's Tale by Mark Helprin (W Title)


9. Language Shock by Gregory Agar (A Author)


10. Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes (C Author)


11. Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck (S Author)


12. Mila 18 by Leon Uris (U Author)

Happy reading!

Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen

Northanger Abbey was Jane Austen's first book ever written and last ever published. I believe is was published posthumously and I'm not sure she ever intended for it to be read by an audience (although I have not read anything one way or the other). The book seemed to me to be a study in writing novels. She asked and answered a lot of questions in this book. What makes a heroine or a plot worthy of reading? Which works to take inspiration from, which to completely diverge from? Are novels worthy endeavors? Can one be written about normal people? Will doing so make novels more socially acceptable? Do popular opinions matter on the subject of novels anyway? Jane makes many asides to the audience which I felt were more of a stream of consciousness creative writing exercise than anything else. I especially felt that the book was not intended to be published at the end when she essentially said, "and then they all lived happily ever after, etc., etc. You know all the rest and I can fill it all in later without giving it much thought." It is possible that this was an underdeveloped stylistic choice, especially considering the similar though less abrupt ending of Emma. I think however, that Northanger Abbey was just a practice to help the author decide more precisely on a direction to take her work.

I didn't particularly like this book and I found the asides to the audience on par with political lobbyist soapboxes, of which I am not a fan. I am quite glad I had read a number of other Jane Austens before reading this one. I fear that I would not have picked up any of the much more worthy ones, had I read this one first. I don't think anyone should miss out on Austen but in this case I am going to have to say skip this one, at least until you have read some of her other more wonderful books.

Wicked by Gregory Maguire

I read this book cover to cover and for the first two days afterwards I couldn't even tell if I liked it or not.

The book is interesting, creative, and well thought out. I was intrigued by the histories, cultures, religion, and politics of the different ethnicities in Maguire's Oz. I particularly appreciated the way their many folktales offered an explanation for the various and incongruous accounts of the events and characters portrayed in the Baum books. I did not like the people of Maguire's Oz, however. I found them to be a morally bankrupt society on an apocalyptic level. The story was fraught with murder, intrigue, and sexual perversions of every sort. I found it offensive on many levels. It also took me a very long time to get into the story.

Elphaba, a.k.a.- the Wicked Witch of the West- goes through most of her life just trying to do what is right in spite of the wicked world in which she lives. She is constantly helping others and receives only the smallest portion of love from others in return. She is a tragic character and you hope that in the end she will go to some afterlife prepared for the inhabitants of Oz. This is not to be however, since there is no "After" for witches. Perhaps this is best, since it is her hope to cease a painful existance.

If this book were a movie, it would receive an "R"-rating at the very least. I understand that the musical is quite family friendly, so if you are interested in hearing the twist on the tale, I would buy tickets to a production and skip this one altogether.

The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd

The Secret Life of Bees is set in the Civil Rights Era in South Carolina. It's about Lily Owens, a white teenage girl whose mother is killed when she is a child. When her black substitute mother offends a dangerous and racist man, Lily makes the decision to take the woman and escape to a town Lily's mother may have visited in the past. They are taken in by three black women on a honey farm and Lily learns for the first time the meanings of love and family. She courageously faces fear, racism, abuse, and the enigmatic truths about her life. This book has some strange religious themes but I liked the story anyway. It was definitely something more substantial. I would recommend this book to women but probably not to men. It's a little too "Lifetime Original Movie" for a co-ed audience.

First Two Book Reviews

I posted these first two book reviews on my other blog.

The first was "The Jane Austen Book Club". The short story is that I hated it. For the long story you can go here.

The second was "Love Walked In". Yes it did. I loved this book. Here is my review.

More to come soon!