Swiss Author Alain de Botton's "The Course of Love" It Never Runs Smooth but It's What We Do, WHY?

Alain de Botton (b Switzerland 1969) is a Swiss/British writer of fiction and non-fiction; "How Proust Can Change Your Life" (1997.)  His philosophical & moving novel about romance & marriage with its trials & tribulations between Rabih and Kirsten is endlessly fascinating & profound. "The Course of Love," is befuddled as to "... why anyone wants to get married."  The author makes clever  clinical observations on the evolution of romance to love, marriage, baby carriage, infidelity, cruelty & perhaps compromised comfort in companionship.  However, nothing is mundane or pedantic in this charming & alarming wake-up call as to what we should consider when considering the other person in our relationship.  De Botton observations are referred to as "romantic order" - not as a command, but in the natural progression of romance, relationships & life unfolding.  The unlikely pairing of of the swarthy, reserved Rabih, born in Lebanon and the resourceful Kirsten, a fair skinned bonnie lass from Scotland is in itself a miraculous compilation of coincidental connections.  Typically what we call love, is merely the start of love as it veers & develops in unpredictable ways.  But, the lure (for sure) is the promise of ending loneliness.  Still, marriage is an optimistic gamble where the house generally wins.  If only the ecstatic feelings compelling us forward into marriage could be perpetual. But, blissful & wishful emotions erode over time.  De Botton's penetrating writing explores more than the love between a couple.  He captures the transforming power of love for one's children.  And, wittingly, notes obsolete notions of marriage, parenting, monogamy and expectations for harmony.  There is a plethora of wisdom in witnessing the evolution of Rabih & Kirsten as individuals, as a couple and parents.  We're privy to their marriage counseling.  This proves humorous as well as sagacious.  Rabih justifies his adultery because monogamy is tantamount to an infidelity towards the richness of life.   Rabih realizes a loving marriage & children kill erotic spontaneity and an affair can destroy a marriage.  There is no solution for combining the paradigms for sexual exploration & maintaining security within the family.  The narrator speaks for both parties (but mostly from Rabih's perspective) notes:  "Marriage:  a deeply peculiar & ultimately unkind thing to inflict on anyone one claims to care for."  Many tongue in cheek comments are tinged with wry witticism & tenderness of heart. "The Course of Love" was contemplative & cunning from beginning to end.  Don't detour from this delightful discourse on the course of love.  "Love is a skill, not just an enthusiasm."

"The Portable Veblen" by Elizabeth McKenzie - Nat'l Book Award Longlist

Elizabeth McKenzie's novel is a quirky, unique, bizarre, thoughtful social commentary on marriage.  But that's only peanuts because it's also a serious commentary on the never ending machination of war, and the inhumane treatment of our veterans.  There's plenty more buried kernels of provocative criticism regarding our over medicated society, and the nefarious practices of pharmaceutical companies.  McKenzie unearths family dysfunction, narcissism & and mental illness.  Our main heroine is Veblen, a 30 something single woman and only child.  Her mother drives her daughter nuts with her neurotic, hypochondriac shenanigans.  Veblen's father resides in a mental institution after having suffered from PTS in Viet Nam.  After the war, he was never the same.  Who can fault Veblen for thinking she is able to communicate & maintain a relationship with squirrels.  A little crazy, maybe, but understandable & even admirable.  Veblen works as a temp at a medical research office at Stanford where she meets Paul, a neurologist research Dr.  The two have a whirlwind romance that falters along a bumpy road to the altar.  Paul also comes from dysfunctional family which includes a mentally challenged brother.  Still, Veblen & Paul are a couple whose romance you very much want to succeed.  Veblen is a likable, steadfast individual who communicates with squirrels.  Her hero is Thorstein Veblen the pragmatic socialist (b Amer 1854-1929.)  His most memorable quote being "Invention is the mother of necessity." Another of his statements "All business sagacity reduces itself in the last analysis to judicious sabotage" Paul discovers to be true as his medical innovation is perversely manipulated for commercial gain. He becomes a whistle blower against the pharmaceutical conglomerate.  Of course this is a couple we'd like to find wedded bliss together.  Although McKenzie observes some trials & tribulations of being a couple as "a phasing out of one's own's likes," "perpetual acts of insolence" and "the deterioration of intimacies."  "The Portable Veblen" is an endearing novel that digs up many serious & troubling issues with a love story to treasure.  It's an amazingly nutty find.

Adam Johnson's "Fortune Smiles" Wins Nat'l Book Award-Unfortunately He Plagiarized "Goodbye for Now"

Adam Johnson (b Amer 1967) is a writer of immense talent.  His novel deservedly won the Pulitzer Prize in (2013) for his piercing tale of the brutal regime inside North Korea.  "Fortune Smiles" a collection of short stories won the Nat'l Book Award (2015) but should be discredited for plagiarizing Laurie Frankel's novel "Goodbye for Now" (2013).   Frankel's novel & Johnson's short story "Nirvana" have way too much in common.  Both male heroes are tech savvy geniuses who've developed algorithms that reincarnate a loved one on the internet allowing for an ongoing simulated conversation that is eerily real.  Frankel pursued the comfort or grief of maintaining a dialogue with someone revered after their death.  "Nirvana" the 1st short story in Johnson's collection  is about a husband whose a whiz at writing programming code.  His wife Charlotte, has been suffering from Guillain-Barre syndrome leaving her totally immobile from her shoulders down for the past 9 months.  Most patients recover mobility but for those who haven't had any improvement in 9 months, the prognosis is poor.   The only comfort in Charlotte's life comes from listening to Kurt Cobain's music.  To persuade his wife life is worth living he's willing to do anything.  He develops an algorithm program that archives a person's images, videos and data; essentially everything recorded by an individual and allows for the image to respond in a coherent conversation.  The idea & content for Johnson's "Nirvana" is notoriously appropriated from Frankel's 2013 novel "Goodbye for Now."  The 2nd story in the collection is "Hurricanes Anonymous".  It takes place in New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina.  This short story is a disaster.  It's ambigious what it's trying to achieve.  Is this about the failure of our nation to respond or of a man who floats along through life whichever way the wind blows?  Nonc is the main character.  He assumes the child left in his van is his from a previous relationship but he doesn't fully assume fatherhood.  It's also a story about Nonc & his dysfunctional relationship with his mute, dying father.  This story left me speechless for someone as gifted a writer as Adam Johnson.  "Dark Meadow" is a disturbing story of child sexual abuse and child pornography on the internet.  The other 2 stories "George Orwell Was a Friend of Mine" delves into prison life in East Berlin before the wall came down and "Fortune Smiles" revisits the oppressive N Korean regime.  Adam Johnson proved himself a master storyteller in "The Orphan Master's Son" but is disappointedly adrift in the short story format.  Most unfortunately, "Nirvana" is NOT an original idea.

Canadian Author Alistair MacLeod's "No Great Mischief" Winner of the It'l IMPAC Dublin Literary Award

Alistair MacLeod (b Canada 1936-2014) has received numerous literary awards including the Int'l Dublin IMPAC for "Not Great Mischief" and the PEN/Malamud Award.  MacLeod's expansive novel is an epic tale that traces the MacDonald clan from Scotland at the end of the 18th C to Nova Scotia where the family brood took root and ventured out up until the 1980's.  The underlying pulse to the novel is the importance of blood and family loyalty.  The historical background from their origins on the Highlands of Scotland is told from the family patriarchs repeatedly throughout this family saga. For fans of the show OUTLANDER (and I'm one) this is somewhat interesting but also somewhat labored.  The MacDonalds are a proud & hard working people of sturdy stock.  Except many also become heavy drinkers and social outcasts; living off the rough land & becoming eccentric & self-destructive.  Alexander MacDonald is the narrator whose coming of age story reflects on his undying love for his clan, their hardships, unconventionalities and firm reliance on one another.  Alexander & his twin sister are orphaned at a young age when their parents & an older brother drown while crossing over the ice to the lighthouse they maintained.  The depiction of this tragedy is both harrowing & beautifully told.  Alexander & his twin sister are left to be raised by their hard working & hard drinking grandfather.  Alexander's three older brothers are they left to live on their own in a rustic shack with no plumbing or heating.  Still, none waver in their faith & loyalties to one another.   Such strong family ties builds divides between people of different lands; different languages, views & ways of doing things.  Adversities & resentment develop between those outside the family with drastic consequences.  The unifying language among humanity comes from music.  Music is the lubricant that makes life easier and unites people.  I felt "No Great Mischeif" became overburdened in its repetitiveness.  The trope touted throughout "look after your own blood" and it's a shame "to care too much an try too hard."  MacLeod's steadfast efforts to create a family saga of a devoted clan did not move me enough to care.

Melinda's Top Ten Book Picks for 2017

The following are my favorite books for the year so far listed in alphabetical order by author:


1.   American writer Judd Apatow's "Sick in the Head"  Interviews of top comedians

2.   Irish author Sara Baume's "A Line Made by Walking"

3.   American author Chris Bachelder 's "The Throwback Special

4.   Irish author Sebastian Barry's "Days Without End"

5.   American author Paul Beatty's  "The Sellout"

6.   Israeli author David Grossman's "A Horse Walked into a Bar'

7.    Irish author Patrick McCabe's "The Butcher Boy"

8.    Indian author Karan Mahajan's "The Association of Small Bombs"

9.    American writer George Saunders' "Lincoln at the Bardot"

10.  Scottish author Ali Smith "Autumn"

Israeli Author David Grossman's Novel "A Horse Walked into a Bar" The Human Comedy of Grief & Guilt

Israeli writer David Grossman (b Israel 1954) is a highly acclaimed & awarded writing of both fiction & non-fiction.  His most recent novel "A Horse Walked into a Bar" received the Int'l Man Booker Prize 2017.  This is a novel of trenchant searching for the unique essence of each individual, "that thing that comes out of person without his control."  Grossman's profound genius for storytelling is artful & impassioned.  He spins a complex yarn that threads together 3 lives in a masterful game of chess.  Dovelah Greenstein is the star of this show.  He's a standup comic with a routine that includes a litany of jokes "A horse walks into a bar and asks the barman for a Goldstar on tap." One of  many running comedy bits that start but veer off, not into a laughable punchline but quixotically through his pathetic & self-effacing life.  In the audience is a retired prestigious judge,  Avishai Lazar, with whom Dovelah remembers as having a brief but meaningful friendship in their youth.  The great thing about humor, sometimes it allows you to laugh allowing for a brief reprieve from torment.  The clever contrivance of novel unfolds relentlessly over one standup routine Dovelan delivers with the intent of obtaining some validity or penance from his old friend whom he's not seen in 4 decades.  Dovelah is a rapacious raconteur able to elicit a connection with his audience that stirs up a murky pleasure both sickening & alluring.  The reader becomes captive to Dovelah's routine; a loose camouflage to convey the oppressive guilt & remorse he endures.  Avishai surprises himself by agreeing to come to listen & staying for Dovelah outpourings on stage.  Avishai is jolted into recalling memories of his life which have been suppressed and the grief he harbors for his wife.  He consents to provide a brief "judicial" reckoning for Dovelah from watching his performance art.  Both men are surprised by the presence of a diminutive woman in the audience who recalls Dovelah as the kind boy in her neighborhood who walked on his hands giving a topsy-turvy view on things.  She adds her own adamant vantage of the boy she remembers.  The consummate force of this remarkable work is how it grasps the reader with its stunning recognition of what it means to survive.  Just to be alive, how subversive it is and what a rare treasure to be able to experience life.   "A Horse Walked in a Bar" is a strenuous journey through life's suffering mitigated with the miracles of love & laughter.   I recommend reading this novel & nominating Grossman for a Nobel Prize in Literature.

Collected Short Stories by Roxane Gay "Difficult Women" Well Written but Painful to Read

Roxane Gay is a writer of great skill & creative genius.  Her collection of short stories "Difficult Women" were all impregnable & deeply disturbing.  I was fascinated & repelled by her powerful short stories.  Her troubling tropes all tie in with themes that make life difficult for women.  Once I succumbed to her omnipotence as a storyteller I surrendered to horrific subjects of physical abuse, sexual abuse and a base animalistic nature possessed by women that harbors incredible rage & anger. Gay writes convincingly of the transparency of women except as sexual object.  Several of Gay's stories deal with the immense agony of losing one's child & the guilt that can only be mitigated seeking penance by being brutally beaten or sexually molested.  Interestingly, Gay writes often about children without siblings whose parents only had enough love for one child.  Twins appeared to be the only ones able to love selflessly & maintain healthy relationships.  For the most part, there was a plan for escape from relationships or a need to push a loved one away.   Gay confronts racism & "jungle fever" a lust for women of color.  Brown enough to satisfy sexual desires but not too dark as to be considered unattractive of problematic.  Prejudice is seen as being passed from generation to generation.  There was an overall oppressiveness to Gay's stories.   Even a mother's misguided words or advice prove excruciating.  A mother mourning her child killed in an accident is blamed by her mother "How could you let this happen."   The stories are over wrought with rage, violence resentment and self-loathing.  In addition to the hostilities & self-destruction is the pall of despair & worthlessness in many ways handed down from the mother.  One mother shares her misguided wisdom "You make friends with the ugliest kid in your class and you make friends with the loneliest kids in your class.  The ones off by themselves.  They will be the best friends you've ever had and they will make you feel better about yourself."  And the advice one mother gives her daughter for holding onto her man, "No mystery to keeping a man.  You do whatever sick thing he wants, when he wants and you'll never have a problem."  I have no quarrel with the expertise of Gay's piercing stories that cut like a knife.  However, the stories are grim, depressing & upsetting.  These stories are not for the tame.