Just Finished Reading....

Tim Egan's, The Worst Hard Time, a chronical of the American Dust Bowl of the 30's.  About 30 years ago I had an elderly visiting teaching companion who had lived through those days on the high plains.  I appreciated Egan's efforts to tell the story through the eyes and voices of people who lived this nightmare.  When I complain about gray skies, at least my gray skies dropped rain, not silt.  My gray skies nourish the plants, instead of killing them.                   

The story begins with a grassland that was home to 470 native species.  "In the spring, the carpet flowered amid the green, and as wind blew, it looked like music on the ground."  (p. 19)  My part of Kansas was  not plowed so heavily as the dustbowl of western Kansas, Eastern Colorado, and the Texas and Oklahoma Panhandles.  Still I grew up loving the way the wheat moves in the wind, the shape of the hills formed by great seas and plenty of sky with blue days and milky way nights.  Today some conservation efforts aim at the native grass lands and they are a pleasure to roam.

All that empty land looked like a great way to make money to speculators and dreamers.  It looked like a great place to make a home to displaced Germans from Russia.  It became a place where only the truly tenacious survived the near decade of wind and drought.  Those who stayed remember dusters filled with more than just dust.  They were cold in the winter, they were charged with static electricity, they weighed down roofs to the point of collapse and filled lungs and stomachs of animals and people with grit.  People died of  "dust pneumonia."  They lived for years without income and bottled Russian Thistle (aka tumbleweed) so they would have something to put in their bellies.  They tried to entice animals into eating the thistle by salting it.

"They knew black dust came from Kansas, red from eastern Oklahoma, a yellow-orange from Texas" (p. 175)   No one wanted to go outside, to get lost, to get scoured, perhaps blinded by the grit.  They were warned not to go out, but inside wasn't much better.  The wind sifted the dust through the smallest of cracks.  Wet towels placed at the doors soon became muddied.  It could be dark at mid-day.

The grass wasn't the only thing disturbed by the effects of men plowing the earth.  Rabbits and grasshoppers thrived and became pests.  The human population nose-dived as people abandoned the farms the banks and the drought were claiming.  A feeling of hopelessness blanketed those who stayed.  Some stayed because they had no means of going anywhere else.  All for them seemed lost.  Even strong men and women would cry behind the barns hoping for privacy in their despair.

It was worth reading.

The Lost Symbol

OK, I may not be reading the "Twilight" books, but I do read Dan Brown.  Quick reads, page turners...
I don't know how accurate Brown's linguistic and symbolic interpretations are but they are what makes the stories enjoyable.  This story starts with a kidnapping and evolves to something more complex.  Of course the perpetrator of this is determined that this is an act of revenge and therefore those who have wronged him must suffer significantly......  The hero and heroine are not sure who to trust as they try to rescue their kidnapped brother and friend.  They are also unaware of the full purpose of the crime which come to light as they interpret situations and clues.

I am fond of character in literature, Mr. Brown doesn't spend much time on character.  But the world could possibly use a few more Peter Solomans.  Peter is the target of revenge.  His sister and friend are trying to find him before the dastardly dude does him in and we discover the nature of their loyalties as they interact.  Peter really has very little plot time, but his is the most fully developed character.  He is admirable in his compassion, generosity, restraint and his cultivation of the greatness in others. 

Recent Reading

I've decided to make a record of my reading.  I know that I like to know what books others find engaging, just in case I every need an idea for a book to read.

I will forewarn you that my reading is rather random.  Our library has this great section the call "Explore More"
"Explore .." is all new books (hence no smoker smell) and they are paper back editions of books that have had good reviews (hence no pulp fiction)  I never know what will be on that shelf, but it is a little bit like browsing a small book store.  Occasionally I find a book not to my taste, inspite of it's initial appeal, but I don't have to keep reading it.

Recently from the "Explore More" collection I read "The Blue Zone" - by Dan Buettner about extreme longevity and the practices that seem to contribute to it.  OK I'm never going to do some of those things - and am not sure that I want to live to be 105, but I am starting to drink more water and eat more nuts and get a little bit more exercise.

The second book from "Explore More" is titled "Islands Apart" by Ken McAlpine.   It is the musing of a man who spent a week camping on each of the channel islands of the coast of California.  Alternating chapters are about trying to find and understand how people find that kind of peace in other places.  He spent time in a monastery, a homeless lunch shelter, a monument to soldiers dying in war,with street performers, and at a preschool.   Some charm to his descriptions of the solitude of the islands and perhaps more insight into how people cope with the conflicts of life in other settings. His concluding sentence is, "the world comes in every hue and we are fortunate to dwell in them all."

I often will find an author that I like and try to read everything the library has that they have written.  I have loved reading Malcom Gladwell, Tracy Kidder, Michael Pollan, Tony Hillerman, Orson Scott Card, Ellis Peters....  Recently David brought home a couple of Card books that we haven't previously read.

"Ender in Exile"  fills in the gaps in the Ender series.  Card has become a better writer over the years.  The characters are better revealed than in the earlier novels.  I love that he has taken a series and retold it from the vantage point of some of the other characters.  Ender is the focal point of this book.  I can't think that there were any great new story lines, just some connections and exposition to exisitng characters.  We see the beginning of the his quest to find a place for the hive.

David also brought home another Card title, "Stonefather."  a charming story set again in a world where people have gifts and talents that are foreign to our world.  A world where your affinity with water or stone rules how and where and with whom you live.  The main character seems to not fit in the world into which he was born and only finds his hidden talent when he leaves home and finds himself in a new setting where his talent comes to light and to good use.  So many of Cards stories are tales of children with impressive talents.  I wonder if he is exploring this theme because of his own development as a writer or recognizes that perhaps all of us have talents, gifts and abilities we do not ever realize we have.  Perhaps there is no "ordinary"

I'd love to hear what you are reading.

Now that I have finished my stack, I can get my library privileges restored and get another load of books.  I wonder what is on the "Explore More" shelves today.