Suzanne Collins: The Hunger Games

 What a revelation.  I expected this to be some poorly constructed kiddie fare, not the masterful narrative it revealed itself to be.  This book has everything that I could want in a young adult novel--every imaginable literary device and technique suitable for introduction to teenagers.  Is the fact that it's also engrossing and enjoyable the cake, or the icing?  Read for pleasure, it is the former.  Taught for learning objectives, it is the latter.  Either way, I look forward to finding a way to teach this next year, and am already writing lesson plans in my mind.

Joan Carris: When the Boys Ran the House

 My sister recently gave me this from her archives, the very copy that we enjoyed as children decades ago.  I had forgotten how much of our family lore came from this book, and how formative it was for me.  I related so deeply to the oldest child at the time I first read it, presumably because  our mother was similarly bedridden at the time.  I felt his frustration, and the burden of premature adulthood, so keenly, and some vestiges of that even came through on this reading 35 years later.  What was expected of him was so similar to what was expected of me, though for much longer and with much less understanding.  Even today, I find myself in the role of moderator for a chaotic, dramatic, and oblivious family.  They might rightly dispute this assessment, but the feelings that this book brought back, and the realization that little has changed for me since I first read it, are mine and I will wallow in them if I see fit.

Kazuo Ishiguro: The Remains of the Day

 While I can appreciate the restrained artistry and masterful storytelling here, I can't say that I was satisfied by it.  What on Earth could I find to relate to in the self-deluded musings of a middle-aged man finding out during the evening of his life just exactly how lonely and aimless he has become?  Oh wait . . . yikes.

While the writing, characterization, imagery, etc. are all top tier, Ishiguro's real feat here is to create a narrator who knows and understands nothing.  Unreliable narrators are everywhere in literature, but they are usually of the lying or dissimulating variety.  I don't know of another example of a narrator that is simply deluded, trying to fit his life into a narrative that it isn't made for.  What is so marvelous about this book is that, while he has convinced himself, he never for a minute convinces the reader.  We see through his careful editing and justification immediately, and recognize in him all of the people in our lives, perhaps ourselves even, that are trying to do the same.  It's a very real, very human thing to do, even if there is some voice in the back of our heads telling us to wake up.  We find ourselves in a life that may or may not actually suit us, and we find reasons to stay in it.  We don't question our narrative, for fear it will be revealed as the flimsiest of veneers.  We latch onto our version of Stevens' "dignity", finding our own watchword to keep in focus, and wear like blinders.  "Virtue", "Service", "Perseverenace", all convenient frames for the realities of existence, which are far less succinct and far messier.  

Until, as it inevitably does, the narrative is asked to bear one final straw, and evaporates like a mist.  What is left in that eponymous moment?  In the Remains of the Life, so to speak?  Has everything been worth it so to speak, or was it a farce all along?  Something to consider, while watching the sun set over a landscape, after all hopes are dashed.  When doing and having fail, is being enough?

Gene Stratton Porter: Daughter of the Land

 How could you, Gene?  How could you put your Kate through all of that?  Where did you find the heart to drag her through such tragedy, stripping her of everything that mattered to her, one after the other, finding new depths of tragedy in every chapter?  Perhaps more than how, I wonder, "Why?"

I should have known that something was up when the handsome man seemingly destined to bring an end to Kate's heartache and loneliness showed up in the first third of the book.  Surely the arc wasn't going to close that quickly, and there would be more to it.  Complications are one thing, however, and a parade of trauma and despair is another.  What possible message could Porter be trying to convey?  

At first the message seemed to be that Kate's stubbornness and elitism were the obstacles in the way of her happiness.  What reader could fail to be frustrated with her when she turned the eligible man away purely on the basis of his spelling?  Surely a Porter heroine would not be so callous and shallow, and this was only a moment of character growth.  Surely Kate would eventually see her mistake, and be led into the Elysian fields.  

Not so.  By Porter's calculations, Kate was right to do so.  The book was not an invective against pride, in the end.  Rather, it was a warning against wanting too much in this world.  There is a place for everyone, and everyone should remain in her place, Porter seems to say.  Kate was right to do as she did, and all the pain and misery that resulted were simply part of life.  Life is, by this reasoning, something to be endured, and happiness is to be found in, not in spite of, hard work and suffering.  

I can't say that I am on board with this philosophy, but neither can I argue against it.  It is all too real and accurate a depiction of existence.  Nonetheless, I could have hoped that Kate be spared some tragedy, and didn't need to go through all of that to find some scrap of contentment.

Rosa Parks: My Story

 This item represents something very rare and difficult to accomplish.  I don't think I've ever read a book with such bare imagery, and no figurative language at all.  It is the very definition of prose: just the facts, with occasional guarded commentary.  It presented quite a challenge to teach, in fact.  What can one use such a book for?  What are the learning objectives, from a purely language arts perspective?  It's too easy.  Too clear.  

This was, no doubt, the point.  After a lifetime in the spotlight, under perilous scrutiny and beset by antagonism from every quarter, it is no surprise that Parks chose the most direct, unassailable version of her story for publication.  No digression.  No axe to grind, and no cry in the wilderness begging for release.  Just a desire to set the record straight, and perhaps to leave a definitive record of events.  

I wonder what Parks kept within her, unexpressed.  What was sacrificed in the service of this style?  What deep, philosophical truths or indelible turns of phrase lay in the ground with her?  We will never know, and clearly that is the way she wanted it.

Agatha Christie: 4:50 from Paddington

 Usually after reading a Christie, my thought is, "She did it again!  She got me!"  Even as used as I am to her mastery, and to being toyed with and manipulated, she still somehow manages to get around my canny reading, and flip me back in my chair with appreciation.  Usually.

In this one, she definitely did not do "it". Whereas the ending of her little games usually makes a delightful sense in retrospect, this one does not.  It almost seems unfair, to the extent that it was ever a game at all.  No, this one was no puzzle, and even less so an elegant and satisfying one.  It was a mere story, one that concluded with a nonplussed "huh."