The Yellow House - Nat'l Book Award Non-F ('19)

Sarah Broom's debut book, "The Yellow House" a memoir of her life before, during and after the deadly Katrina Hurricane which displayed millions of New Orleanians.  The yellow house is the family home which tethers Broom's story and the only thing left.  Broom is the keeper of the family's history starting prior to her birth as the youngest of 12 siblings.  Prior to her memoir, Broom was a journalist published in the "NYT Magazine" and "O, Oprah Magazine".  The book is a historic odyssey of indigenous residents & her relatives flooded into diaspora.  Broom writes as an anthropologist and excavator of what remains.  Unfortunately, outside the house, the families' histories & biographies are awash in details that dilute interest.  Perhaps, there's significance in Broom's formidable accounting of and advocating  for her family.  An intimate reckoning of Katrina's  havoc so many of us choose to ignore makes being indifferent impossible.  It took Sarah's family more than 11 years to settle their claim with the city and in the meantime, most had settled elsewhere without being rooted.   Like Humpty Dumpty, the yellow house couldn't be put back together again nor could the lives of so many residents whose homes were destroyed not to mention the number of fatalities.  Neither of these facts, 1,833 deaths or the millions left homeless are noted in this annotative memoir.   Broom found a spirituality to her quest for answers "as an important inner light."  Her flotsam and jetsam of information is immaterial.  However, the disparity, injustice and displacement of mainly the poorer populous of New Orleans is a torrential downfall.  "The Yellow House" casts a beacon on ongoing corruption, a failing criminal justice and health system, poverty, education and lack of economic possibilities that create for the average local the life-and-death nature of life lived in the city. ..where many children graduate from school without knowing how to spell where neglected communities exist everywhere, sometimes a stone's throw from overabundance."  Noted too is much of what's great and praised about New Orleans comes at the expense of its native black people, underemployed, underpaid and buried beneath the mystique of a magical city that keeps out of sight the city's dysfunction and hopelessness.   The Nat'l Book Award ('19) was awarded "The Yellow House."  Broom's talent for journalistic integrity & insight are prevalent.  The auto-biographic deluge suppresses the story of New Orleanians, which is to say the swamping of the city's lower rung population.

DAISY JONES & the SIX - Not Worth Keeping Up With

Taylor Jenkins Reid's novel "Daisy Jones & the Six" is a Reese Book Club pick.  This is a stamp of approval for a guilty pleasure with little, if any literary measure.  Reese's pick is an indiscernible romance dalliance.  Touted as the sex, drugs & rock & roll era of the 70s but there's no glitter ball  to shed light on the epoch; nothing of note to spin this shaggy-dog story into stuff worth snorting.  Daisy is born with a silver spoon in her mouth and a golden voice.  She's also drop dead gorgeous and everything seems to come her way.  Her looks, confidence & lack of inhibition land her a gig with a rock group called the SIX which shall heretofore be known as Daisy Jones & the Six.  Daisy is endowed with talent for songwriting along with a set of pipes that emote angst, strength & sex.  The storytelling gimmick novel is an interview format by a mystery journalist interviewing Daisy & the other six original bandmates who were unwittingly or unwilling orchestrated by Billy.  Billy is your long haired, denim on denim sex magnet.  Billy is also married to Camilla with 3 young daughters.   Daisy has dynamite chemistry with Billy but Camilla is no wallflower.  The limping pulse to the novel is whether Billy will stay on the wagon or stray from his wife.  Camilla is a straight shooter with plenty to say.  It's for the reader to say whether she's solid as a rock or more of a doormat.  Billy's younger brother Graham is in the band and he's so in love with Karen on the keyboards. Eddie is hassled.  Pete has a life outside the band.  Warren warrants little attention and the people interviewed outside the band don't add much to the mix.  The whole shebang is a sappy, crappy tale of unrequited love.  DAISY JONES & the SIX belongs in Davey Jone's locker.  However, if you're searching for some easy, breezy read for the beach, this might strike the right chord.

ORANGE WORLD - Short Stories: Horror, Sci-Fi, Magical, Magnificent

Karen Russell ORANGE WORLD is a collection of short stories that are outside the realm of reality that really draw you in and get under your skin.  Call her genre horror if you will sci-fi.  Still, you will become immersed into the surreal and sublime world created by this award winning writing.  Russell's ORANGE WORLD won the National Magazine Award for Fiction ('19).  Her debut novel "Swamplandia" ('12) was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize.  Russell is a writer extraordinaire unafraid to chart new territories, merging the imaginary with reality, the magical & formidable as well as beauty amidst horror.  The 8 short stories are all eerie & exciting in their own shimmery & scintillating way.  They share a common ephemeral thread that lures the reader into a mounting sense of dread.  The stories cross over into a realm that unities the living with the dead.  Russell skillfully endows the inanimate with sentient conscious.  In "The Gondoliers" Russell a not too distant or dis believable apocalyptic future manifests a mystical allure.  "I didn't know who I was, what I was.  The face floating on the water was not mine, not yet.  The silence that let me ripple out of my body, until at last I felt entirely at peace, whole and unfractured. One with the wildest  turnings of the universe."  An ominous foreboding of death morphs into feelings of serenity and a continuity to life.  Russell demonstrates a desire to sync opposing forces into one.  In "Madame Bovary's Greyhound" Russell writes "Moods blew from one mind to the other, delight and melancholy."  ORANGE WORLD is a marvel to read.  It has the mesmerizing quality to spiral into your heart and reorganize your perceptions into something new & astounding.

Pam Houston's DEEP CREEK -Salvation in Acreage

Writer Pam Houston' love for the 120 acres she owns & shares with numerous dogs, horses and farm animals is the home she'd rather not have to roam from - but to stay she must make her way by writing & teaching.  Teaching courses takes her far from the land, dogs & horses she loves; of course.  In her crystal writing we discover  how she lives, learns & loves nature's bounty within her withering fencing that gives DEEP CREEK FINDING HOPE IN THE HIGH COUNTRY its profound majestic prose. I credit Pam for intense attention to the needs for her your animals, all animals & the planet and for her candid reflections of falling protecting the planet.  Her plane rides alone are harming the environment  - but lest I cast stones, she is not alone. Pam's prose shares her awe of nature, animals & wildfire which is infectious & inspiring to be self-reflective & conscientious about protecting our global planet.  Pam has a lot of friends who join her from time to time and I wish I could be included amongst her favored few.  I'd love to endeavor alongside her & journey forth on her ventures.  Pam shares her childhood of trauma and abuse that is difficult to digest.  Her candor takes you into her confidence but makes you wince. The fires that destroyed so much acreage in CO are horrific.  I can identify with fears & grief having endured devastating fires in CA and am at loss for the destruction in Australia.  I wish to find hope in Pam's outlook but it is one of cautious optimism combined with activism to protect our planet.   Houston writes candidly & cogently.  I recommend DEEP CREEK for her clear & compelling writing.  Moreover, this is a woman of resiliency, compassion and strength.  There are many worthwhile life lessons to be gleaned including the beauty of solitude and self-reliance.  Houston instills a calmness & awareness of nature's beauty without preaching.