Choosing Books: A Potpourri of Recent Reads

What is it that makes us select the books we want to read? How do we choose, from all the hundreds of possibilities, the titles that draw us in? Here are a few books that I've read recently (and enjoyed), and the hooks that made me pick them.

I selected The Goodbye Cousins, by Maggie Leffler, based on the recommendation of an author that I've already read and loved. Elinor Lipman commented, "I loved this book and loved its voice." Well, I love Elinor Lipman's voice, so if it's good enough for her, it's good enough for me.

I often shy away from memoirs, especially those written by people I've never heard of. What can make the life of a heretofore unknown individual interesting enough to read about? I'm Down, by Mishna Wolff, had this intriguing note on its cover: "Mishna grew up in a poor black neighborhood with her single father, a white man who truly believed he was black." Cover quotes attest to the book's humor, and the publisher compares the author to Augusten Burroughs in her ability to "make you laugh and move you at the same time."

Sometimes, a title is enough to put you off what might be an otherwise wonderful book. That was the case with The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie, by Alan Bradley. It is, in my mind, an odd and unappealing title. However, writer Laurie R. King, one of my favorites, praises it lavishly on the cover, and the publisher seals the deal with the following comment: "Meet Flavia de Luce, an aspiring chemist with a passion for poison, a taste for homicide, an obsession with delving into the forbidden past of her taciturn, widowed father ... and did we mention she's eleven years old?"

One of the first books I blogged about was The Wednesday Sisters. Its author, Meg Waite Clayton, gives a warm recommendation to The Late, Lamented Molly Marx, by Sally Koslow. What really caught my eye, though, was the publisher's comment: "The circumstances of Molly Marx's death may be suspicious, but she hasn't lost her joie de vivre."

All four of these books are quick, fun reads, and all are recommended.

Review: Handle with Care

Handle with Care, by Jodi Picoult. (New York: Atria Books, 2009)

Willow O'Keefe is a smart, funny five-year-old with osteogenesis imperfecta (OI), or "brittle bone" disease. Her first fractures occur in utero, and the next breaks take place just after her birth. Handle with Care examines the extraordinary pressures on the family, especially on the mother, of a child who needs so much care.

Willow's mother, Charlotte, once a successful pastry chef, now cares for her young daughter full time. She becomes an effective, even aggressive, medical advocate for Willow during her frequent hospitalizations for broken bones. Her focus on Willow creates a distance between Charlotte and her policeman husband, Sean, and makes her adolescent daughter, Amelia, feel invisible.

Charlotte sets in motion a "wrongful birth" lawsuit, alleging that her obstetrician, who is also her best friend, did not give her the critical information she needed that would have given her the option to terminate her pregnancy. Charlotte believes that a substantial legal settlement is the only way for Willow to have a comfortable life, especially after her parents are gone.

Because of the lawsuit and the pressure it creates, Charlotte finds herself adrift and distant from all the people she loves -- her husband, her best friend, and her older daughter. Even her lawyer finds Charlotte's lawsuit distasteful. Nonetheless, Charlotte pushes on, firm in her belief that her choice is the only right one.

This book is brimful of issues. In addition to a child with OI and a wrongful birth lawsuit, Picoult throws in divorce, bulimia, cutting, shoplifting, Catholic pro-life beliefs, medical malpractice, and an adult adoptee searching for her birth mother. While there are enough themes going on here to supply several books, they don't really get in the way of getting this story told. Narration is accomplished through a variety of characters, all of whom address themselves to Willow.

This is the first Jodi Picoult novel I've read, although she's been recommended to me by my librarian friends for years. The book has strong characters, a compelling storyline, and plenty of surprises. I'll have to begin looking at Picoult's "also by" list for more titles to read.

Review: Outliers

Outliers: The Story of Success, by Malcolm Gladwell. (Little, Brown and Co., 2008)

Malcolm Gladwell does it again. As in his earlier books, The Tipping Point and Blink, he rounds up research from a variety of sources to support an intriguing idea. In this case, he questions why it is that some individuals rocket to success, while others, with seemingly equal potential, achieve much less. He posits that an "outlier," someone who achieves at a level outside statistical norms, really owes his success to a variety of factors that are not in his control.

As he marches through a series of case studies and summaries of research, the author delivers the argument that the very successful benefit from opportunities as diverse as birth dates, parenting styles, and cultural legacies. In all cases, though, he points to the value of cumulative hours of work undertaken by his high achievers, whether he is talking about Bill Gates or the Beatles. While we assume that great success is bestowed upon those with outsize intelligence or ambition, Gladwell marshalls research and examines biographies to show how his selected "outliers" actually developed.

As the book progresses, the reader looks for, but does not find, any evidence or argument against Gladwell's chosen thesis. Nonetheless, the research he presents is intriguing and endlessly debatable. Outliers would make a great selection for a book discussion group.

Gladwell is an excellent writer, and he pulls the reader into his argument using fascinating and readable examples. While the ending is a bit indulgent, this short book, overall, is well worth your time.

An Elinor Lipman Fest

It's only February, and I've already read two new Elinor Lipman novels this year. Ms. Lipman is regularly referred to as the Jane Austen of our time, because of her wise, wry, comic chronicling of modern American life.

Frederica Hatch is a child of the academic world. Her parents, both professors at a second-rate college in the Boston area, make extra money as dorm parents, and Frederica has enjoyed the benefits of dozens of new "older sisters" every year. She is also doted upon by her liberal activist parents, who have always treated her as an adult and a full member of the family. Or so she thought. In My Latest Grievance, the teenaged narrator is dismayed to learn that her father has kept his first marriage a secret from her. His ex-wife, as different from Frederica's Ph. D. mother as it is possible to be, finds a job on the same campus, and Frederica becomes her close friend, partly out of curiosity and partly for revenge.

Meanwhile, in The Family Man, scheduled for publication in May 2009, Ms. Lipman takes on some quite different family dynamics. Henry, once married to Denise and stepfather to her young daughter Thalia, came out as a gay man, after Denise left him for another man. The novel finds him on the point of retirement from the legal profession. Guilt has followed him throughout his life because of his lost relationship with Thalia, and he has surreptitiously kept track of the milestones in her life. When Denise's husband dies, Henry reconnects with Thalia and begins to build a new kind of family life that includes his ex-wife (and her new boyfriend), his stepdaughter, and his own boyfriend, Todd. Ms. Lipman draws each of her oddball characters with affection and humor, and she shows us a family as modern as today.

If you haven't yet read Elinor Lipman, you're in for a treat.

Review: The Good Thief

The Good Thief, by Hannah Tinti. (The Dial Press, 2008.)

A one-handed infant is dropped at the gates of a Catholic monastery in New England sometime in the 19^th century. Ren, named for the three letters sewn into the garment he wears, spends his childhood dreaming of being reunited with his mother and father.

As a young teenager, he is released into the custody of a man who claims to be his long-lost brother. Benjamin is actually a con artist and snake oil salesman, who makes Ren his accomplice in life on the wrong side of the law. Ren, a naïf filled with innocence, faith, and prayer, is nonetheless accomplished at the art of light-handed theft and turns out to be of great value to his new benefactor.

Ren’s adventures on the underside of life are reminiscent of the picaresque novels popular in the 18^th century. Many reviewers have compared the author’s work to that of Robert Louis Stevenson. The reader is treated to an ironic depiction of the many shapes that families can take. Beware: As this captivating story progresses, there is no shortage of violence, tragedy, or terror.

Recommended for adults and young adults, especially those who enjoy Dickens-style characters and adventures.

Review: Life After Genius

Life After Genius, by M. Ann Jacoby. (New York: Grand Central Publishing, 2008)

Mead Fegley is the kind of kid that other kids love to pick on. He's smaller than average, he lacks social graces, and he's a math genius. He heads off to college after graduating from high school at age 15, hoping that his life will change and that his fellow students will appreciate him for his intellectual talents. He continues to excel academically, but his youth and his awkward ways prevent him from developing real friendships.

This book works very well as a coming-of-age story. Mead is self-centered and introspective, in the way that most children and adolescents are, but his outsize intelligence exaggerates these qualities. He is bright and engaging and even likable in his internal musings, but becomes sarcastic and supercilious when he tries to relate to others. The author capably illustrates the difficulties faced by a child who stands out in a small town. Townspeople invariably categorize him as "the young Fegley genius."

Where the book falters is in Jacoby's treatment of Mead's life as a college student. He works hard and is singled out for academic honors, but he appears to suffer from some delusional episodes. In his relationship with Herman, his academic rival and social superior, the reader is hard pressed to distinguish between what is real and what is not.

I'm a sucker for a great title, but Life After Genius promises more than it delivers. The story is told mostly in flashbacks, after Mead inexplicably leaves college for his hometown a few days before graduation, but the reader never really learns whether or how Mead will conduct his life outside his carefully constructed world of mathematical genius.

While the book is interesting and, in some parts, quite compelling, overall, it suffers from inconsistencies and, perhaps, too ambitious a storyline. Jacoby could have saved some of the plot twists for other books and made this one simpler and more enjoyable. Nonetheless, I recommend it to readers of general fiction.

Brief Review: The Story of Edgar Sawtelle

The Story of Edgar Sawtelle, by David Wroblewski. (New York: Ecco, 2008)

This Oprah selection is showing up on all the Best of 2008 lists. Both Stephen King and Richard Russo, two very different kinds of writers, wrote recommendations for the back cover of the book, and that's what made me decide to read it. I'm a little more than halfway through, so this may be a premature post, but I'm finding it to be an engaging story with remarkable characters.

Edgar is born without the ability to speak, although he is normal in every other way. A precocious child, he reads early and learns sign language to communicate with his parents. His parents, by the way, are the second generation breeders of an unusual kind of dog, one whose pedigree is based on character and personality, rather than thoroughbred lines.

Oprah's recommendation will be enough to encourage book clubs everywhere to take on this novel. Read this even if you're the kind of reader who stays away from the popular stuff. There's a lot to appreciate -- imagery, character development, story line -- in The Story of Edgar Sawtelle.