The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri
Posted on November 21, 2009 by thekoolaidmom
Title: The Namesake
Author: Jhumpa Lahiri
For being a foreigner, Ashima is beginning to realize, is a sort of lifelong pregnancy – a perpetual wait, a constant burden, a continuous feeling out of sorts. It is an ongoing responsibility, a parenthesis in what had once been ordinary life, only to discover that that previous life has vanished, replaced by something more complicated and demanding. Like pregnancy, being a foreigner, Ashima believes, is something that elicits the same curiosity from strangers, the same combination of pity and respect.
–The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri, pages 49-50
My first experience with the Ganguli family happened two years ago when I brought the DVD copy of the movie home from the library. I thought then that it was a beautiful and rich story, and was excited to find out it was also a book. After a few months of picking it up and putting it back, I finally bought a paperback of it from Waldenbooks about a year or so ago, but it sat on the shelf since then… calling to me whenever I looked in the general area of the bookshelf where it sat. And after reading Confessions of a Shopaholic, I decided it was time for something a little more lasting and meaningful, so I finally began the journey and story of Ashoke and Ashima Ganguli, and their children Gogol and Sonia.
When thinking about how to describe The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri, the word that keeps coming to mind is "quiet". Lahiri slowly weaves a beautiful tapestry of the love and living and feelings of being an immigrant family. The different customs and how the culture of the land in which you live can so overtake you and change you in ways you can't even realize. First and foremost, it is a love story: The love of a man and wife, the love of parents for their children, the love for one's family, and the love of one's homeland. It's also a story of the journey we all must take of self-acceptance, and, after that, the acceptance of others. Of course, the "Indian-ness" of it is also beautiful and intriguing.
One of the things I find fascinating from this book is the realization that all people everywhere share the burden of growing up, of culture, and of the hopes and expectations of their parents. For the majority of us, we caring these burdens among our own people… fellow humans who share similar experiences in this and this helps us not feel so alone. However, for those who have left their native lands, there can be a constant ache and isolation as they endure the struggles of life without the ability to lean on someone who can understand how they feel. What's more, the first generation born in another land are even more isolated, having one foot in the old and new country, they can neither relate to their parents who have no understanding of the way things are in their adopted homeland, nor can they fully relate to their peers who either don't have any concept of their home life or they find it a curiosity.
Interestingly, after reading this book, it has made me take a second look and given me a deeper respect for Maggie's dad, who left his own homeland of Vietnam more than ten years ago and has recently become a naturalized US citizen. Not that I didn't have respect for him before, but rather gained a bit more empathy for him. It's also given me another perspective with Maggie, who made a passing comment recently how she sometimes wishes she was either all Vietnamese or all white, as being both sometimes makes her feel outside of either culture.
For it's quiet beauty and it's lasting effect, I give The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri 4 and a 1/2 out of 5 stars.
Filed under: Book Reviews | Tagged: arranged marriage, Ashima, Ashoke, Bengali, children, culture, customs, displacement, family, Ganguli, Gogol, immigrant, India, isolation, love, pregnancy, relationships, second-generation, seperation, Vietnam, Vietnamese | 6 Comments »
Homer's Odyssey by Gwen Cooper
Title: Homer's Odyssey: A Fearless Feline Tale, Or How I Learned About Love and Life with a Blind Wonder Cat
Author: Gwen Cooper
Challenges: ARC Challenge
The last thing Gwen Cooper wanted was another cat. She already had two, not to mention a phenomenally underpaying job and a recently broken heart. Then Gwen's veterinarian called with a story about a three-week-old eyeless kitten who'd been abandoned. It was love at first sight.
Everyone warned that Homer would always be an "underachiever," never as playful or independent as other cats. But the kitten nobody believed in quickly grew into a three-pound dynamo, a tiny daredevil with a giant heart who eagerly made friends with every human who crossed his path. Homer scaled seven-foot bookcases with ease and leapt five feet into the air to catch flies in mid-buzz. He survived being trapped alone for days after 9/11 in an apartment near the World Trade Center, and even saved Gwen's life when he chased off an intruder who broke into their home in the middle of the night.
But it was Homer's unswerving loyalty, his infinite capacity for love, and his joy in the face of all obstacles that inspired Gwen daily and transformed her life. And by the time she met the man she would marry, she realized Homer had taught her the most important lesson of all: Love isn't something you see with your eyes.
Homer's Odyssey is the once-in-a-lifetime story of an extraordinary cat and his human companion. It celebrates the refusal to accept limits -on love, ability, or hope against overwhelming odds. By turns jubilant and moving, it's a memoir for anybody who's ever fallen completely and helplessly in love with a pet.
-Inside dust cover of Homer's Odyssey by Gwen Cooper
Okay… breathe… I'm going to do my best to review this book on the its merits alone, and not gush about the author herself. It would be easy for me to go on about how, upon hearing that my daughter, also named Gwen, loves animals and has a black cat, was really excited by the book when I got my advanced reader copy and wanted me to read it to her, emailed me for my address and not only sent her a signed copy of the finished book with a beautiful hand-written card and pictures of Homer, but also sent her a copy of the audio book. AND that, with all that she's got going on in her life with book-signings, fundraisers and feeling under the weather, she still takes time message us and even remembers my daughter's cat's name. But this is a review of the book, not the author, so I will focus my attention on that.
Homer's Odyssey by Gwen Cooper is a memoir of how the things that we might never choose on our own can be exactly what we need. It is about recognizing value in someone or something and building your life around it. It is about how, by looking at life and love through the eyes of another, we take on the traits we admire in that person. In Gwen Cooper's case, that person was a blind wonder cat, through whom she learned courage, how to love, and perseverance.
One thing I really like about this book is the format. It's set up as a journey from who and where Gwen was when she got the call from the vet about the eyeless kitten whom nobody wanted and would likely be put down if she, his last chance, didn't adopt him, continues through jobs and moves and romances, and ends with what she has learned and insights she has gained through knowing and loving and living with Homer. But, each chapter is also a tale in and of itself, making it a book that can be devoured straight through (honestly, it's very hard to put down) or you can nibble on it and ponder each lesson. Also, each chapter begins with a picture, usually of Homer, but occasionally of Scarlett or Vashti, Homer's big sisters, and a quote from the other Homer, the Greek storyteller.
Another thing that I enjoyed with this book is Gwen's sense of humor. There are so many laugh-out-loud moments, like bringing her date in and the two of them being greeted by a cat who not only discovered the tampons, but how to unwrap them, proudly carrying them in his mouth to show to his mommy. Also, there is a quality to her writing that made me feel like we've been friends for years.
Like life, though, the book isn't all sunshine and roses. There are real dangers and some terrifying moments, like waking up to find a burglar in her apartment. As well as the heart wrenching days after September 11th, when Gwen tried desperately to get back to her cats who were trapped in their apartment, just blocks from where the two towers had stood.
I found Homer's Odyssey by Gwen Cooper to be moving and inspirational, at times hilarious and touching, and am thankful that there was a vet who refused to accept that an eyeless kitten was better off being put down, that Gwen Cooper was in the vet's contacts list and opened her heart to him, and that she has shared Homer and his wisdom with all of us. I give Homer's Odyssey by Gwen Cooper 5 out of 5 stars. It's one of my favorites and I'll be rereading it again and again 🙂
Filed under: ARC Challenge, Book Reviews | Tagged: adoption, animal love, blind cat, Book review, cat, disability, growing up, Gwen Cooper, Homer, inspiration, inspirational, Jewish, life, love, marriage, memoir, moving, non-fiction, parents, relationships, romance, September 11, siblings | 7 Comments »
The Memory Keeper's Daughter by Kim Edwards
Title: The Memory Keeper's Daughter
Author: Kim Edwards
The head crowned. In three more pushes it emerged, and then the body slid into his waiting hands and the baby cried out, its blue skin pinking up.
It was a boy, red-faced and dark-haired, his eyes alert, suspicious of the lights and the cold bright slap of air. The doctor tied the umbilical cord and cut it. My son, he allowed himself to think. My son.
"Where is the baby?" his wife asked, opening her eyes and pushing hair away from her flushed face. "Is everything all right?"
"It's a boy," the doctor said, smiling down at her. "We have a son. You'll see him as soon as he's clean. He's absolutely perfect."
His wife's face, soft with relief and exhaustion, suddenly tightened with another contraction… he understood what was happening… "Nurse?" the doctor said, "I need you here. Right now."
…"Twins?" the nurse asked.
…This baby was smaller and came easily… "It's a girl," he said, and cradled her like a football… The blue eyes were cloudy, the hair jet black, but he barely noticed all of this. What he was looking at were the unmistakable features, the eyes turned up as if with laughter, the epcantha fold across the lids, the flattened nose… A mongoloid.
–The Memory Keeper's Daughter by Kim Edwards, pages 15-16
When Norah Henry goes into labor during a blizzard (I know, very Lifetime Movie, right?), Dr. David Henry is forced to deliver their children himself. There is only one other person present at the delivery, the office nurse, Caroline Gill. When David realizes that his newborn daughter has Down's Syndrome, he passes her to Caroline with the directions to a "home for the feeble-minded," and the name of the person to talk to there. His intentions are to tell his wife, who is passed out from the anaesthetic gas, about their daughter's condition when she comes to, however, when the moment arrives, he lies to her and tells her the girl is dead and her body sent to be buried in the family cemetery on his partner's farm. In her grief, Norah plans and announces a memorial for the lost child, "Phoebe," and informs David of all this after it's been made public, sticking him fast to the story he told her of the baby's death.
Caroline, after seeing the deplorable conditions of the place David has sent his daughter to be dumped off and after being informed that the person to whom she was to speak no longer works there, decides to keep Phoebe. Caroline, now in her early 30s, has spent her whole life waiting for her life to begin, waiting to be someone and to make a difference, she takes Phoebe and moves to Pittsburgh to raise her as her own.
The Memory Keeper's Daughter by Kim Edwards is the unfolding of the outcome of David's decision. It shows how this one secret, and really, much more that David has kept all his life, erects a wall between him and his family. In his attempt to spare his wife and son the pain of having a daughter and sister who's condition he believes will be a burden on them their entire life, he has only substituted one pain for another. By the time he realizes his lie has caused more heartache than the truth ever could, his family has become individuals, islands unto themselves, lonely and feeling like they could never be good enough for the rest.
Because this book does a great job at recreating the sentiments of the time period toward special needs children, there are times when what's being said is offensive. My two older girls have special needs, and when the nurse in the Pittsburgh hospital asks Caroline if she really wants her to save Phoebe's life, it rankled me as much as it did Caroline. The book doesn't crank out a happily ever after scenario, nor does it become an "Oh my God, yet another tragedy" soap opera, instead it presents a plausible, heart-felt outcome.
Things to keep in mind if you plan to read this book: It is a real look at what life is like raising a child with special needs, and raising that child into adulthood. It is a lifetime of events, and therefore can seem long, but it doesn't drag. Also, it does have heavy and sad moments, the character's don't do "the right thing" and there are no heroes… except maybe Paul and Phoebe, and even then maybe just Phoebe.
The Memory Keeper's Daughter by Kim Edwards can help the reader have more compassion for caretakers of special needs children, as well as having a moral that the truth is always the better way to go, that the best of intentions is often the surest and straightest path to Hell. I give it 4 out of 5 stars.
P.S. Do NOT watch the Lifetime movie of this. It is officially the WORST book to movie EVER! EVER EVER EVER EVER EVER! I give that POS movie NEGATIVE infinity out of 5 stars. It made the characters appear flat and shallow, it changed parts of the story that didn't need changed and it was just plain crap. Anyone who says they didn't like the book because the characters were shallow and selfish, I have to wonder if they really read the book or watched the movie.
Filed under: Book Reviews | Tagged: 60s, adoption, adultery, affair, caretaking, death, disability, divorce, doctor, Down Syndrome, drama, family, family relationships, fiction, grief, Kentucky, Kim Edwards, Lexington, lies, loss, love, marriage, orthopedics, parenting, photography, Pittsburgh, relationships, secrets, special needs, The Memory Keeper's Daughter, twins, twins seperated at birth | 11 Comments »
Empire Falls by Richard Russo
Title: Empire Falls
Author: Richard Russo
Publisher: Vitage Books (a div of Random House)
Miscellaneous: Empire Falls won the 2002 Pulitizer Prize for Fiction
"Has it ever occurred to you that life is a river, dear boy?" Mrs. Whiting said when Miles sat down opposite her in the gazebo. In asking this question the old woman managed to convey, as with all such queries, that she was not anticipating a response that would enlighten her. Whereas some people's attitude suggested that perhaps they knew something you didn't, Mrs. Whiting's implied that she knew everything you didn't. She alone had been paying attention, so it was her duty to bring you at least partially up to speed.
–Empire Falls by Richard Russo, page 161
Empire Falls by Richard Russois the multi-faceted and complex tale of the Central Maine town of Empire Falls. Woven together like a rich tapestry, it tells of the cross-generational intersections of the lives of its denizens, with the life of Miles Roby the central focus.
Miles has spent most of his life going with the flow. A devout Catholic, he's predisposed to motivation-by-guilt and a nagging sensation that everything bad that's ever happened can somehow, if one looked hard enough, back to him and is his fault. His desire to always do the right thing gives him the unintended air of moral superiority that can be repellent, and the fact that he attended 3 1/2 years of college before returning to Empire Falls when his mother was on her death bed gives him an added perception of intellectual superiority. All of this is not a truth about Miles, only what others sometime perceive about him.
Opposite Miles are Jimmy Minty and Mrs. Whiting. Jimmy Minty, Mr. Empire Falls as he referred to himself, is a police officer and possibly the next Chief of Police. Whereas Miles can seem morally and intellectually superior to the town even though it's everything he is NOT, Minty is the "everyman". People may not like him, but at least he's one of them and knows it. What the town does NOT know is that this "everyman" has keys to each and every lock in Dexter County, a houseful of stolen electronics and no tangible income to explain his ownership of a shiny, new, red Camaro.
Minty's off-the-book work as Mrs. Whiting's muscle is, of course, how he affords the car. Think of a Bedford Falls in which George Baily just went along, obligingly, with what Old Man Potter said, and you'd have Empire Falls. Mrs. Whiting is Russo's answer to Mr. Potter. Incapable of feeling love herself, she has an incredible knack of uncovering that affliction in others and does her best to eradicate it. "Power and Control" are the words by which she lives, and tells Miles that people often confuse will with power, and that the "power" they perceive the lucky few as having is simply that they know what they want in life and go after it.
"You appear to have been visited by some sort of revelation, dear boy," Mrs. Whiting observed. "Here's my suggestion, though. Why not think things over? Passionate decisions are seldom very sound."
"When did you ever feel passion?"
"Well, it's true I'm seldom swept away like those with more romantic temperaments," she conceded. "But we are what we are, and what can't be cured must be endured."
"What can't be cured mus be avenged," Miles said. "Isn't that what you mean?"
She smiled appreciatively. "Payback is how we endure, dear boy…"
–Empire Falls by Richard Russo, pages 434-435
Another of Miles nemeses, Timmy the Cat, is one of my favorite characters in this book. Timmy, found and adopted by Mrs. Whiting's daughter Cindy, had, as a small kitten, been placed in a sack with her litter-mates and tossed into the Knox, the river that runs through Empire Falls. She was the lone survivor and never right in the head ever after. Described by Miles in such loving terms as "psychotic" or "homicidal", Timmy is whispered by the townspeople (usually in the bar and after a few drinks) to be Mrs. Whiting's familiar. Appearing as if from thin air whenever Mrs. Whiting's name is spoken, as if the uttering of her mistress's name was the spell to summon the demon cat. In a way, Timmy is representative of Mrs. Whiting's nature and how she relates to people, as if she were a cat and they the wounded prey she toyed with until they bored her and she finally ended their lives.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
It took me a while to finish Empire Falls, and a bit longer than that to write this review. It is a dense and complex novel, with several sub-plots and sub-stories. There's Tick, Miles's daughter, and her steady march to adulthood. Will she become passive and resigned to whatever the fate's bring like her dad? David Roby, Miles (maybe half) brother, and his life of sobriety after an accident caused by his own drunk driving, rendered his left hand useless. And, of course, there's the incorrigible Max Roby, Miles father, who's life philosophy can be condensed into two words, "So What!" Max is always on the look out for the hand out and badgers his son for money, promising him if he'd just give him $500 then he'd take off for the Florida Keys, and he'd be out of Miles's hair for a whole New England winter. Tempting, Miles thinks, before realizing the old man would just call for more money once he got there.
After considering and weighing Empire Falls by Richard Russo, I came to the understanding that the best way to describe it is that it's a "grown up book". Not necessarily for language, though it does have plenty of that, nor for sexual content, ditto, or for violence, though there is animal cruelty and a shooting in it, but rather that it's the kind of book that rings several emotional and experiential bells that one needs to have lived a little to even begin to catch the nuances and appreciate the full sensations found in the book.
For its intimate and tangible moving portrayal of life in a small town, I give Empire Falls by Richard Russo 4 1/2 out of 5 stars. I cannot, for the life of me, explain why I'm holding that last 1/2 back… perhaps because it's not a WOW book, but rather, like water slowly flowing along, eroding the rocks and banks slowly and imperceptively over time, until, all at once and a long way down river, it'll suddenly hit me.
I've been watching the HBO mini-series Empire Falls, based on this book. It's a really good show, and does a good job of staying close to the book, in spirit if not literally. The screenplay was also written by Richard Russo. As for the casting, I wasn't entirely stoked about Ed Harris as Miles, but I did like Paul Newman's Max Roby, and thought William Fichtner as Jimmy Minty was SPOT ON. 🙂
and a twofer, this one is a brief "making of" but gives a great feel for the book itself.
Filed under: Book Reviews | Tagged: American Literature, animal cruelty, bullying, Catholicism, change, child abuse, company town, control, corruption, deception, divorce, dreams, family, fiction, friendship, hate, homosexuality, lies, life, love, mid-life, Miles Roby, Mrs. Whiting, power, power and control, Priest, Pulitzer Prize, relationships, religion, remarry, remorse, rich versus Poor, school shooting, secrets, sexuality, small town, union busting, unrequited love | 3 Comments »
Dough: A Memoir by Mort Zachter
Title: Dough: A Memoir
Author: Mort Zachter
Publisher: Harper Collins
What would you do if you found out your uncle, the one who wears the same suit he did when Reagan was inaugurated (the first time) and drives around in the same junkyard escapee that looks like an accordion for the last thirty years, had over 6 million dollars? While you've struggled to make a family and pay bills, your uncle's been sitting on a mound of cash, never offering to help and always saying how broke he is.
That is what happened to Mort Zachter, grandson and nephew of Jewish Russian immigrants. "The Store", as it has always been referred, was the family owned and run bakery. Began by Mort's grandparents as a pushcart vendor that graduated to a Lower East Side 9th Street storefront, the Wolk family sold day old breads and cakes to the neighborhood. A beloved fixture for over forty years, it almost never closed… not for sabbat, high holidays, weddings or blizzards… Zachter's uncles and mother moved the merchandise. They never went hungry, but they never were rich… or so Mort thought.
When his father's illness requires Mort to take care of his uncle's affairs, he discovers his uncle is loaded, to the tune of six million dollars. Dough: A Memoir takes the reader on the journey of discovery, realization, understanding and forgiveness. How could you not pity a man who has done without everything because he is "poor", but has three brokerage accounts each with over a million in them?
I liked this book. It's a short, fun and funny, touching read that is both a retelling of a life and a lesson to enjoy life now. This book is rich with texture: the smells of the bread and Suzy the cat in the bakery, Food Stamp Passovers, and complicated people. Uncle Harry wasn't just a selfish bastard, but he was also the joking uncle who pulled people in, a Jewish Tom Sawyer who got people to work for free, oddly generous at times, and always his own man.
Harry Wolk had his faults, but he was a larger than life figure, overall, loved and well-known by customers. Zachter conveys this story without hatred, bitterness, or condemnation. One particular scene it in the book sums up how bad the uncles' hoarding had been. While cleaning up Uncle Harry's apartment, Mort finds boxes and boxes of unused, unopened appliances, cutlery, cookware and other stuff. The question is asked why they'd have bought stuff and never used it, the answer:
…It had to be a freebee… I was remembering the full-page savings-and-loan advertisements in the New York Post when I was a kid. Open your passbook savings account with us and receive your choice of the following gifts absolutely free… I plunged my hands deeply into the drawer and pulled out its contents over and over again. Bankbooks flowed from my fingertips, reflecting the maelstrom of New York City's ever-changing financial history… Multiple accounts existed for each bank. All the accounts were closed…
My grandma was like Uncle Harry. She save-save-saved, even taking her own children's pay and 4-H prizes, and never enjoying her life with it. She would manipulate others to her own purposes, and would tell her overburdened children "You'll inherit it when I'm dead," if they ever spoke up for themselves. The trouble is, she is now in a nursing home, dementia has taken her and her life's savings. It's such a waste that she didn't enjoy life more and spend that money on her and her families happiness. At least SHE would've gotten the benefit of it. Now it's all gone a golf bag and a down payment on some doctor's second summer home.
Filed under: Book Reviews | Tagged: bakery, eccentric relatives, family, forgiveness, generations, greed, hoarder, immigration, Jewish, love, millionaire, OCD, poverty, relationships, relatives, selfishness, store | 9 Comments »