A Tale of Ancient Greece

Glory and the Lightning
Taylor Caldwell
Hardcover: 500 pages
Publisher: Doubleday and Co. Inc. (1974)
Rated 5 stars of 5 possible


Glory and the Lightning is based on the life of Aspasia, the beautiful and intelligent courtesan who eventually became the companion of Pericles, ruler of Athens. Rejected by her father, and hidden from him by her mother, Aspasia, when she is but a few days old, is given to and raised by a woman who runs a high-class school for courtesans. Aspasia receives an education well above what most women of her time are allowed.

Much research and imagination went into the creation of this marvelous tapestry of ancient Greece. While the culture has it's attractions, the barbaric treatment of most women at that time is likely to be repulsive to some. Still, I find the novel to be a page turner. The historical facts presented here are accurate enough to give the reader a clear picture of the early 5th century BC... and if the author took a few liberties with her facts... well, the book IS sold as fiction, not a book of history, after all.

I recommend this to readers interested in fiction that is laced with lots of imagination and has some interesting historical personages as the main characters, as well as some relevant historical information.

Bizarre Excuses

The Cat Ate My Gym Suit  
by Paula Danziger      
Format: Paperback, 148 pages  
Publisher: Yearling (1983)
Rated 3 stars of 5 possible

Marcy Lewis, a girl with a poor self-image and a slight weight problem hates gym class, so she gives her teacher some bizarre and untrue excuses why she can't particpate in the class activities. This book's title is just one of those excuses. Then, along comes Ms. Finney, a new English teacher who does not believe in saluting the flag and teaches her classes using controversial methods that make the more conservative members of the community - including Mr. Stone, the school principal - feel uncomfortable. Marcy's father is also opposed to the methods used by Ms. Finney. The thing is, Ms. Finney not only teaches good English and makes her classes interesting, she also teaches good commuication skills, thinking outside the box, and gives the students a new-found confidence in themselves.

The concept is good, the writing decent, but the humor falls flat all too often, so I'm downgrading the rating of this book to just three stars because I don't feel the story has the impact it could possibly have. Of the suporting cast of characters, Marcy's mother could be a little more aware that she's probably a big part of her daugher's weight problem by serving ice cream whenever Marcy comes home after a bad day at school - of which there are far too many... Mother, of course does realize her contribution to Marcy's excess weight but is rather slow to do anything about it; nor does Marcy ever seem to realize what she is doing to herself.

And then there's the little brother, Stuart. He loves Marcy with the innocence that only very young children seem to have, but he's far too cute and is not just a scene stealer but a complete show-stealer. Too much focus is on little brother. More focus should be on Marcy, since she is the main character and little Stuart only part of a large supporting cast.

Recommended for Paula Danziger fans... and might be usable as a discussion book in junior highschool English classes.  Regrettably, it's not for everyone.

Fantasy At Its Zaniest

Dark Lord of Derkholm
By Diana Wynne Jones
Hardcover: 352 pages
Publisher: Greenwillow; 1st edition (October 29, 1998)
Rated 5 stars of 5 possible

Derkholm is a fantasy world peopled with wizards and griffins and dragons and a variety of other interesting types of people, including some who are ordinary and some extraordinary.  It is also a tourist attraction for another world, but the people of Derkholm are fed up with the tyrannical Mr. Chesney and his pilgrim parties so they petition their High Chancellor to put a stop to these expeditions once and for all.

What follows is more fun than a barrel of monkeys when Wizard Derk is chosen to be this year's Dark Lord and his son Blade is chosen to be the Wizard Guide. Even the dragons and griffins have to get into the act... and then, of course, Murphy's Law intervenes. Dark Lord of Derkholm is fantasy at its zaniest. I haven't laughed so hard since I first read Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy many years ago.

Recommended to fantasy lovers age 12 and up who are not put off by some violence in the story, which, in this case is a necessary part of the plot.

Almost A Changeling

The Secret Garden
By Frances Hodgson Burnett
Hardcover: 375 pages
The Phillips Publishing Co (1910, 1911)
Rated 4 stars of 5 possible

Written nearly 100 years ago, The Secret Garden is one of many coming of age stories in existence. Mary Lennox, a very unpleasant young girl, is suddenly orphaned. She travels from India, where she was born and spent the first part of her life, to England so that she may be cared for by her only surviving relative, an old Uncle, who has a secret that he has kept for ten years.

The author had me intrigued first with Mary, then with her Uncle's secret... and after that, with Mary's progress as she becomes more civilized, changing from a half-wild and completely unlikable person into someone the reader can care about and who is important to other characters in the story...

Despite variances in the English language which have occurred within the last century, I found this refreshing and delightful tale was easily understandable and quite different from most of the YA novels of today. I recommend it to all readers from age 10 and up who are looking for something different. 

While this book can probably be found either used or in a new edition at many bookstores, the reader will also be able to download The Secret Garden free from Project Gutenberg. There are several different formats from which to choose at the first link, Or, if you prefer to listen, Project Gutenberg has several different audio formats available as well.

Madness and Mayhem

First Family
by David Baldacci
Hardcover: 464 pages
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing (April 21, 2009)
Rated 4 stars of 5 possible

A child's birthday party ends in a kidnapping. Murder, mayhem, and secrets are soon to be revealed. The First Family of the USA is clearly involved, but just how deep does their involvement go?  A former Secret Service agent turned PI is chasing her own demons, but puts her own concerns aside to follow up on the kidnapping along with her partner, another former Secret Service agent...

David Baldacci's thriller is gripping, non-stop action, slightly reminiscent of some of the early John Grisham novels but also clearly a different style of writing. Fast paced and very ingriguing, I found First Family very hard to put down. While this is the fourth book featuring the two former Secret Service agents, First Family stands on its own, it is quite readable as a stand-alone book.

Be warned, however, if you are looking for a book that's been carefully edited and free of typographical and grammatical errors, this isn't it. Without even looking for such errors, I found about five of them throughout the novel.  Unlike other reviewers, I didn't get bored reading First Family, nor do I believe it precisely fits into the old formulaic kids' detective story format. And oh yes, those annoying typos? The story was so gripping I didn't have time to be annoyed at the editing - or lack thereof - but I do think such sloppy editing reflects badly on the publisher and on the author...

Clearly Written

An Introduction to Art and Drawing
By Linda Drewry
Paperback: 150 Pages
Publisher: Darnley Publishing Group
Rated: 4 stars of 5 possible

Two years ago next week, I started posting my book reviews on this blog. In that amount of time, I've reviewed several art instruction books... some are better than others.  An Introduction to Art and Drawing by Linda Drewry is one of the better instruction books I've attempted to use. Unfortunately, you can't just go out and buy it new at your favorite bookstore, and probably not used either. :(  I know I'm not letting go of my copy... The main purpose of the book is as a text book for the art class I'm currently taking via correspondence course from Stratford Career Institute, which also seems to be the only source for obtaining this excellent book.

Over the last four years, I've attempted via use of several different media, to learn how to draw.  Of all the different sources I have encountered, this book is the only one to actually explain perspective in a way that has helped me improve my skills. This improvement in skills is slowly beginning to allow my sketches to take on a more realistic look exactly as I wanted. The explanation of concepts is, for the most part, clearly written and illustrations are to the point as well as frequent enough within the text to bring out those concepts more clearly.

About one dozen practical exercises plus three full-fledged drawing projects is enough to give even a very raw beginner a pack of educational resources and  explanations on which to build his or her drawing skills. Recommended for art students of all ages from 14 and up... if you can find it.

Suspenseful and Surprising

Mudbound
by Hillary Jordan
Paperback: 336 pages
Publisher: Windmill (January 1, 2008)
Rated 5 stars of 5 possible

Mudbound starts off in an ominous mood, with two brothers burying their father.  The weather in the Mississippi Delta has been rainy for the previous three days, but they have finally gotten the break in the weather they were looking for, so the brothers decide it's best if they complete the necessary digging as quickly as possible...  In a shifting, kaleidoscopic viewpoint, the story is told piece by piece, while suspense builds. Laura McAllan's voice holds the package together - she both begins at the true beginning and fills in some of the details left out of the other characters' chapters. We soon discover that the old man is both abusive and racist, and that even his own family despises him.

Being a resident of the real Mississippi Delta, I feel obligated to point out that the author has taken some liberty with her geography.  In reality, there is a Marietta, Mississippi - near which the story says the farm, Mudbound, is located - but Marietta is not as close to Greenville as Ms Jordan would have you believe.  I will forgive her that discrepancy for giving us this wonderful novel... a little slight of hand with the location of the towns mentioned doesn't harm the story...

Mudbound has the flavor of a historical novel blended with mystery and suspense all in the same tightly written package. The characters are fully fleshed and of both types, those you love and those you love to hate.  Long before the story ends, you'll figure out what's inevitably going to happen... yet there's still a compulsion to continue reading. A surprise is buried in the twisted ending which will leave you feeling both shocked and devastated, yet that ending is wholly appropriate to this compelling tale.

This isn't a YA book by any stretch of the imagination and is also not recommended for those sensitive to violence. Yet with that caviat in mind, I do recommend this book to the majority of readers looking for something that doesn't fit into the "light and fluffy" category

In Search Of The Truth

The Daugher of Time
By Josephine Tey
Hardcover: 206 pages
Publisher: Simon & Schuster, Inc
Rated 5 stars of 5 possible.

Truth is the daugher of time - Old Proverb

While laid up with a broken leg, Inspector Alan Grant of Scotland Yard becomes interested in one of history's most famous and vicious crimes. Taking up his friend's suggestion that he do some academic investigation, Grant determines to find out whether Richard III killed his brother's children to secure his own claim to the crown or whether Richard could have been the victim of the usurpers of England's throne. Can Inspector Grant uncover the truth after all these centuries?  Josephine Tey (aka Elizabeth MacKintosh) weaves a compelling tale in which she defends Richard III against the horrible accusation posed in most history books.

The main character, Inspector Grant, strikes me as being a work-a-holic, never content to relax or to accept the status quo. I was fascinated by the information uncovered by Inspector Grant and would have liked to have seen a bibliography of sources used to provide the alternate view of history. Such sources would make possible my own research along the lines this character followed.  As it is, I now question whether historians have given us an accurate account of the happenings roughly 520 years past and do not lightly accept one author's view of history.  Perhaps that is enough...

 

Powerful and Deeply Moving

The Help
by Kathryn Stockett
Hardcover: 464 pages
Publisher: Putnam Adult (February 10, 2009)
Rated 5 stars of 5 possible


It is 1962 and the world is at a volitile stage.  Immediately prior to the beginning of the civil rights movement, a young college graduate - Miss Eugenia "Skeeter" Phelan - becomes interested in the plight of colored women working as maids to the elitist white women in Jackson Mississippi. "A deeply moving novel filled with poignancy, humor, and hope, The Help is a timeless and universal story about the lines we abide by, and the ones we don't." - (Stockett, 2009)

Ms Stockett does a good job of realistically portraying the characters, making the reader a part of the story from page one. Her antagonists (especially the hypocritical and pushy Hilly Holbrook) were so realistic I wanted to tell them where to go, just as I would do in real life with people bearing the same personalities... and I wanted to alternately hug and beat some sense into the annoyingly passive Elizabeth Leefolt. who does only what she's told instead of showing any of her own initiative.  Miss Skeeter, Aibileen and Minny are, of course, to be admired for their determination and courage and daring.

Important historical events such as the murder of Medgar Evers and the assinations of Martin Luther King Jr. and John F. Kennedy were accurately placed at the times where they belong. This helped give a realistic historical sense of the times depicted as well as enhancing the story. The liberties taken with history were minor - using a couple of songs prior to the time those tunes had actually been released - which actually helped the story progress rather than working against it as a major historical flaw would have done.

The Help is one of the best new novels I've read this year - quite possibly the best of the best.  It should not be missed.

Worthwhile, but Not For Everyone

The Little Giant of Aberdeen County
by Tiffany Baker
Hardcover: 341 pages
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing (January 8, 2009)
Rated 4 stars of 5 possible

The Little Giant of Aberdeen County explores the prejudices and discriminatory practices used against a girl born with a hormonal disorder that causes her to become enormous. How she deals with the townspeople makes an intriguing story, but some parts push the suspension of disbelief a little too far.

For instance, in one chapter, the main character talks about things that happen before she was born. She could not possibly know these things from personal experience, yet she speaks as if she were watching on the sidelines or directly involved. She does not say "I was told..." or any similar phrase to qualify her narration of these events. Fortunately, the chapters in this book are not extremely long and the author does not obviously continue this disturbing practice in later chapters.

In all, the novel is a nicely paced, smoothly narrated page turner that I found well worth reading. Most parts of the story are so realistically told that I had to keep reminding myself "this is fiction."  The author does a credible job of making the reader a part of the world of this story, which has an appropriately satisfying ending.  Recommended to readers age 14 and up who are looking for something very different to read and who can tolerate the bit of pushing on the suspension of disbelief envelope which happens early in the story.