2003 Readers & Writers on the Air Summer Reading List

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. . . humor in a living culture must not be put away in the attic with the flag, but flaunted, like the flag, bravely. . .Every time is a time for comedy in a world of tension that would languish without it.”

— James Thurber

I came across this quote in the introduction to Mirth of a Nation: The Best Contemporary Humor, edited by Michael J. Rosen. We are certainly living in tense times. Humor is more important than ever. You’ll find a mix of titles on this year’s summer reading list: from light and frothy to dark and deep. Thanks to everyone who helped us compile the list. Special thanks to Chris Robinson of Clarkson University’s School of Arts and Sciences, my frequent co-host on Readers & Writers on the Air. Thanks, also, to Lenny Golay, who joined Chris and me for the summer reading call in. Lenny is the owner of The Corner Bookstore in Manhattan; she summers in the Adirondacks. You may find it interesting to get on the Bookstore’s mailing list—regular reviews and suggestions—or stop by when you’re in New York (1313 Madison Avenue at 93rd, NY, NY 10128 or email, cornerbook@aol.com.

Throughout the year, feel free to contact me with titles of books you’ve enjoyed reading and wish to recommend to others (there’s always a new list in the making). Email me at ellen@ncpr.org, or send your suggestions and comments to Ellen Rocco, North Country Public Radio, St. Lawrence University, Canton, NY 13617, or call me at 315-229-5356.

I’ve sprinkled the list with some of the winners from The Washington Post’s most recent style invitational contest, in which readers are challenged to take any word from the dictionary, alter it by adding, subtracting or changing one letter, and then supply a new definition. A bit of leavening… per Thurber’s admonition… Hope your summer is filled with good reading, some real belly laughs and, of course, great radio listening.

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Intaxication: Euphoria at getting a tax refund, which lasts until you realize it was your money to start with.

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FROM NCPR STAFF AND VOLUNTEERS

First, two recent novels to recommend:

• The Dive From Clausen’s Pier, Ann Packer.
• Three Junes, Julia Glass. National Book Award winner.
• Now, the subject of my most recent “cluster” reading: Cambodia.
• Buddha Wept, Rocco Lo Bosco. A short, quiet and unromanticized tale of emergence from the dark tunnel of the Cambodian holocaust.
• A Blessing Over Ashes: The Remarkable Odyseey of My Unlikely Brother, Adam Fifield. This book, a true story, corroborates the perception of the Cambodian holocaust in Buddha Wept, and then takes us into present time with the journey of a young Cambodian who is adopted by an American family.
• First They Killed My Father: A Daughter of CambodiaRemembers, Loung Ung.
• A History of Cambodia, David Chandler.
• Soul Survivors: Stories of Women and Children in Cambodia, Carol Wagner, et al.
• Children of Cambodia’s Killing Fields: Memoirs by Survivors, Dith Pran. This is a collection put together by the Cambodian made famous in the film, The Killing Fields.
• The Caged Birds of Phnom Penh, Frederick Lipp and Ronald Himler (illustrator). This is a good one to introduce Cambodia to younger readers.
• NPR News Special: War Crimes, Neal Conan, producer. A one-hour radio documentary now available from audible.com.

By the way, when Rocco Lo Bosco joined us for the summer reading call in, he recommended the following book as helpful in understanding the humankind’s genocidal behavior in the 20th century:

• The Problem From Hell: America and The Age of Genocide, Samantha Power.

This summer I find myself working on two book manuscripts. Don’t try this at home. The main consequence (other than the stress) is that I spend a lot of time reading things I would not recommend to an enemy. But here are some good things that served to preserve my sanity these past couple of months.

Fiction:

• The First Man, Albert Camus. 1994.
• Great Neck, Jay Cantor.
• Gilligan’s Wake, Tom Carson.
• Hopeful Monsters, Nicholas Moseley.

Non-fiction:

• When Smoke Ran Like Water, Devra Davis. A biographical and epidemiological account of why clean air is important.
• The Nat Hentoff Reader, Nat Hentoff. A nice collection of articles on jazz and the first amendment—cornerstones of free expression.
• Journeys of Simplicity, Phil Harnden.
• Epicurean Simplicity, Stephanie Mills.
• The Miner’s Canary: Enlisting Race, Resisting Power, Transforming Democracy, Lani Guinier and Gerald Torres.
• Brown, Richard Rodriguez.
• The Unconquerable World, Jonathan Schell.
• The Power of Nonviolence: Writings by Advocates of Peace, Howard Zinn.

Poetry:

• Collected Poems, Robert Lowell.
• The Voice at 3 A.M., Charles Simic.
• Poetry for Young People: Wallace Stevens, John Serio, ed.

Philosophy:

• Hans-Georg Gadamer, Jean Grondin. To some, Gadamer was a quiet adherent of Nazism; to others, he acted heroically on behalf of Jewish friends and colleagues.
• Nietzsche, Rudiger Safranski. This is a great biography of a most interesting philosopher and historical figure.

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Reintarnation: Coming back to life as a hillbilly.

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Lenny Golay, Literature call-in guest host/Proprietor, The Corner Bookstore

• The DaVinci Code, Dan Brown. Fiction.
• The Quality of Life Report, Meghan Daum. Fiction.
• Bangkok 8, John Burdett. Fiction.
• The Cruelest Miles: The Heroic Story of Dogs and Men in a Race Against an Epidemic, Gay Salisbury and Laney Salisbury.
• Winter World: The Ingenuity of Animal Survival, Bernd Heinrich. The veteran natural history author and University of Vermont biology professor uses the New England winter as a laboratory for investigating the adaptability and evolution of animals.
• A Short History of Nearly Everything, Bill Bryson.
• Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books, Azar Nafisi.

• Cultivating Delight: A Natural History of My Garden, Diane Ackerman. Anyone who loves flowers, birds, and the rest of the natural world will enjoy this beautifully written book, organized by season. This is not a book about how to plant a garden; it’s about how to truly experience nature through the senses. The author is a poet, teacher and naturalist, who lives near Ithaca (Zone 5-ish) so North Country gardeners will know at least most of the plants and birds she writes about.
• Ahab’s Wife, Sena Jeter Naslund. I recommend this one to everyone all the time. Set mostly on Nantucket in the days of whaling, this is great writing that stays with you a long time. If you don’t remember it well, first re-read one of the great American novels, Herman Melville’s Moby Dick. Then, this one, which is another great American novel, a huge, gorgeous, sweeping tale about a fascinating woman hero, and the issues of her time, including slavery, women’s rights, and religion. It plays off the Captain Ahab story in some surprising ways.
• Atonement, Ian McEwan. Nominated for the Booker Prize. Great writing. Set mostly in summertime England between the world wars, it’s a big, rich book to get lost in, with a story and characters you wil keep thinking about.

Two books I’m reading this summer:

• John Adams, David McCullough. A Pulitzer Prize-winner.
• New World Kitchen, Norman Van Aken. The perfect cookbook for summertime, by one of the most interesting contemporary chefs—he invented the concept of tropical fusion cuisine. He’s also a good writer. Nice photos, some history and great recipes grounded in the New World cuisines of the Caribbean, Central America and South America.

• Even Cowgirls Get the Blues, Tom Robbins.
• Connie Meng, Announcer/Theatre Critic
• The Bad Beginning, Lemony Snickett. Book One of the saga of the Beaudelaire orphans. Great melodramatic stories for kids with plenty of tongue-in-cheek humor for adults.

• Fortune’s Rocks, Anita Shreve. I picked this up after reading The Pilot’s Wife. I hand’t expected the Victorian dialogue, and was at first disappointed, but found myself drawn into it. It’as a great summer read—kind of slow and hot. Lots of ocean scenes. A classic story, with researched historical content. The end disappointed me, but the read was rich.

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Bozone: The substance surrounding stupid people that stops bright ideas from penetrating. The bozone layer, unfortunately, shows little sign of breaking down in the near future.

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David Sommerstein, News Reporter

Two good ones:

• The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay, Michael Chabon. I think I was a little late on the bandwagon with this one, but it’s a great story of love, imagination and creativity, the life of immigrants, New York City in the WWII era, and the history of comic books. By the way, I’m NOT a comic book fan at all, and I loved this.
• Puro Border: Dispatches, Snapshots & Graffiti from the U.S.-Mexico Border, Luis Humberto Crosthwaite, ed. A compilation of writings from the best (mostly) latino writers on the border—writers a little less familiar to us. Compelling and evocative stories, cutting edge writing, and bold political statements on what life is really like in El Norte.

• Surviving Pregnancy Loss: A Complete Sourcebook for Women and Their Families, Rochelle Friendman and Bonnie Gradstein. Well-written and informative, it addresses pregnancy loss due to miscarriage, ectopic pregnancy, and stillbirth—both the physiological aspects and the emotional impacts. It’s great for adults who are dealing—directly or indirectly—with these types of losses. Those who have personally experienced pregnancy loss, partners (opposite- and same-sex), friends and family members can all find something to take away from the book. Also, there’s a chapter on helping children cope with a parent’s pregnancy loss. The chapters are stand-alone, so one can read only the chapters which apply to her/his situation.

• Faceless Killers, Firewall, One Step Behind and The White Lioness, Henning Mankell. Four books in the dark, Swedish detective series, featuring Inspector Kurt Wallender of the Ystad Police Force. They are all police procedural stories set in a climate not unlike our own, with long winters and too short summers. Inspector Wallender is divorced, frequently in trouble with one or more members of the department, alienated from his only daughter, overweight, addicted to caffeine, and in the most recent book I read he has discovered that he is diabetic.
• Detective Inspector Huss, Helene Tursten. Another Swedish detective: married, mother of twins who is an investigator in the Violent Crimes Unit in Goteborg, Sweden.

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Foreploy: Any misrepresentation about youself for the purpose of getting laid.

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Tim Brookes, Author/Commentator

• The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay, Michael Chabon.
• The No.1 Ladies’ Detective Agency, Alexander McCall Smith.
• (List editor’s note: If you like Smith’s first book, you may want to check out the two subsequent books in the series: Tears of the Giraffe and Morality for Beautiful Girls.)

(Jill called in during the program to share a group of titles about “home.”)

• Dispatches from the Muckdog Gazette, Bill Kauffman.
• The Road to Home, Vartan Gregorian.
• Don’t Let’s Go to the Dogs Tonight: An African Childhood, Alexandra Fuller.
• Population 485: Meeting Your Neighbors One Siren at a Time, Michael Perry.

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FROM LISTENERS AND FRIENDS, VIA EMAIL AND LETTERS

• Founding Brothers, Joseph Ellis.

• You Can’t Be Neutral On A Moving Train, Howard Zinn. Memoir.

• Reflections in Bullough’s Pond: Economy and Ecosystem in New England, Diana Muir.

• The Third Reich: A New History, Michael Burleigh.

• The Peloponnesian War, Donald Kagan.
• White Teeth, Zadie Smith.
• Rick Welsh
• Shakey, Mark McDonough. Biography of Neil Young.
• Universities in the Marketplace, Derek Bok.
• Academic Capitalism, Sheila Slaughter and Larry L. Leslie.

• Daughter of Fortune and Portrait in Sepia, Isabel Allende.
• The Bonesetter’s Daughter, Amy Tan.
• The Orchid Thief, Susan Orlean.
• The Passion of Artemisia and Firl in Hyacinth Blue, Susan Vreeland.
• Girl With a Pearl Earring, Tracy Chevalier.
• The Notebook, Nicholas Sparks.
• Angels & Demons, Dan Brown.

• Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood, Marjane Satrapi.
• Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West, Gregory Maguire.
• The novels of Alan Furst.

• Waiting, Ha Jin.

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Cashtration: The act of buying a house, which renders the subject financially impotent for an indefinite period.

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Owen Brady

• Six Easy Pieces, Walter Moseley.
• A Good Walk Spoiled, John Feinstein.

• Sandy Koufax: A Lefty’s Legacy, Jane Leavy.
• July, July: A Novel, Tim O’Brien.

• For summer reading, nothing beats a book of Ray Bradbury short stories—perfect for stormy summer nights.

• Daughters of Joy, Deepak Chopra.
• Everyday Karma, Carmen Harra.

• The Piano Shop on the Left Bank, T.E. Carhart. Very interesting story about an American in Paris and his friendship with the owner of a used piano atelier. Of particular interest to anyone who has played the piano or aspires to do so. Very well written non-fiction.
• Uncle Tungsten, Oliver Sacks. The noted neurologist and author writes about his youth in wartime London and his chemical explorations.

• Isaac Newton, James Gleick. With keen insight and an economy of words, Gleick introduces us to the man who fashioned many concepts we now take for granted and who set a standard for establishing scientific fact that still eludes many disciplines. As Gleick writes, “What Newton learned entered the marrow of what we know without knowing how we know it.” Freeman Dyson has a fine essay in response to Gleick’s book in the July 3, 2002 New York Review of Books.

• The Secret Life of Bees, Sue Monk Kidd.

• Strip Tease, Carl Hiaasen. Fiction.
• The Family Tree, Sheri Tepper. Fiction.
• The Lovely Bones, Alice Sibold. Fiction.
• Fifth Life of the Cat Woman, Kathleen Dexter. Fiction.
• Beyond the Last Village, Alan Rabvinowitz. Biography.

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Giraffiti: Vandalism spray-painted very, very high.

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Mary Lou Cole, North Creek (Town of Johnsburg Librarian)

My picks:

• A Cold Heart, Jonathon Kellerman.
• In the Bleak Midwinter and A Fountain Filled With Blood, Julia Spencer-Fleming. A new author and I am now anxiously awaiting her next book.
• Naked Prey, John Sandford.
• Crumbtown, Joe Connelly.

Flying off the shelves at our library:

• If Looks Could Kill and A Body to Die For, Kate White.
• Best Revenge, Stephen White.
• Lost Light, Michael Connelly.
• Dead Ringer, Lisa Scottoline.
• Forever, Pete Hamill.
• The Guardian, Nicholas Sparks.
• John Glenn: A Memoir, John Glenn with Nick Taylor.
• Dead Aim, Iris Johansen.
• Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, J.K. Rowling.

• Angels and Demons and The Da Vinci Code, Dan Brown. Sometime ago there was an interview with the author on NPR. Because of that, I looked up The Da Vinci Code. However, before that was available, I read the other. Both would be “can’t put down” summer books.

• Tepper Isn’t Going Out, Calvin Trillin. Just read. Such satisfying, dry, sensitive humor, in a NYC vein. Short, warms the soul, makes you nod in agreement while you laugh. Anyone who is familiar with Trillin, will know his approach to life and won’t be disappointed.

• The Collected Stories of Eudora Welty. I pull out my well-worn copy of this every June during the first week of nice hot weather. Welty’s old fashioned southern characters and great descriptions of hot steamy summer weather have been part of my summer for many years.

• My summer reading suggestion is the Harry Potter series. These books really need to be read in order. Even with a busy schedule, I made time to read the latest, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. It was thrilling.

These are all well-written mysteries that I’ve enjoyed recently:

• In a Dry Season, Peter Robinson. Inspector Banks discovers a long-dead body when a reservoir dries up during a drought.
• Take the Bait, S.W. Hubbard. Set in the High Peaks area of the Adirondacks, this mystery about a missing teenager really kept me guessing. Very suspenseful; great local color.
• Basket Case, Carl Hiasson. Witty, engaging, with a quirky obituary-writer as a protagonist.

• Atonement, Ian McEwan. Fiction.
• Here on Earth, Alice Hoffman. Fiction.
• Fragrant Harbor, John Lanchester. Set in Hong Kong. Fiction.
• Passionate Nomad: The Life of Freya Stark, Jane F. Geniesse. About an amazing woman who traveled alone around the mid-East in the 1930s and 40s.

Here is our list of books from our spot on Upper Saranac Lake:

• The Da Vinci Code, Dan Brown. The “smile” is more mysterious than you can imagine.
• The Fig Eater, Jody Shields. Murder myster—Vienna 1910. Shaeds of Freud’s famous patient, Dora.
• Blue Latitudes, Tony Horowitz. Go everywhere Cook went.
• White Rock, Hugh Thompson. Mountain mysteries.

From my visiting daugher, a librarian in Yarmouth, Maine:

• Gilgamesh, Joan Landon. A broad, sweeping multi-generational story of love and loss.
• Life Skills, Wild Designs and Second Thyme Around, Katie Fforde. Lighthearted British romantic comedies. (Ed. Note: Yes, author’s name has two “fs”…this is not a misprint.)

Non-fiction:

• The Crisis of Islam: Bernard Lewis. Roots of conflict in the Middle East.

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Sarchasm: The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn’t get it.

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Lorin Young

The first two are very appropriate for what is currently happening our country:

• My Argument with the Gestapo, Thomas Merton.
• 1984, George Orwell.
• Stranger in a Strange Land, Robert Heinlein. One of my favorites. I read it last summer and I will probably reread it soon. I am about to start another of his, I Will Fear No Evil.

Some books to bring you laughter:

• Confessions of a Failed Southern Lady, Florence King.
• Me Talk Pretty One Day, David Sedaris.
• Full Exposure, Susie Bright. Some hard truths mixed with humor.

• I have to admit that the book I finished most recently and couldn’t put down was the latest Harry Potter. I think it’s the best of the series to date.
• No Ordinary Time, Doris Kearns Goodwin. I loved the combination of a very close look at the Roosevelts—both as a very dysfunctional couple, and as a very important partnership that led the country in the prewar years and beyond. Eleanor, in particular, was tireless in her activism for women’s rights and civil rights, issues that obviously continue to be a challenge today and really began to be addressed because of the war.
• The Human Stain, Philip Wroth.
• The Nine Parts of Desire: The Hidden Life of Muslim Women, Geraldine Brooks.
• Empire Falls, Richard Russo.

• The Partly-Cloudy Patriot, Sarah Vowell. I strongly recommend this one, from the frequent This American Life contributor, to anyone interested in contemporary American society, as well as a large number of good laughs. I liked this book because, like the author, I am a real American history junky who is not particularly happy with a lot of the American history being made today. Her essays about visiting famous historic shrines like Salem, MA, Gettysburg or even Washington DC during the Bush inauguration are both funny and insightful. Vowell admits to being a liberal with a lot of issues with our country’s past and present but, unlike many liberals, she does not bury her unabashed fascination and love of America, in spite of all, in favor of gripes and moans. There are also funny essays about other topics, usually involving her life and times growing up an oddball nerd in a family of midwestern Christian fundamentalists, and her experiences as a young would-be writer in a number of large American cities. Think of a straight, very political, female David Sedaris. I would have more to say except I have given away all five copies I purchased at Christmas.

I read with a group of women during the summer; we choose our titles from previous NCPR lists. Time to return the favor. Here are my offerings:

• The Breadwinner: An Afghan Child in a War Torn Land, Deobrah Ellis. Tells the story of a young girl passing as a boy to support her family of women. It’s actually a juvenile novel but important for all of us.
• The Matisse Stories, A.S. Byatt. She’s the author of Possession of recent movie fame. These are three stories dealing with universal emotions and frustrations.
• No-No Boy, John Okada. The story of a Nisei (first generation Japanese) boy dealing with the draft and prison and its aftermath during and after WWII. Very important story.
• The Power of One, Bryce Courtenay. Great movie (1989) and more expansive book about one boy/man’s experience in South Africa.

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Osteopornosis: A degenerate disease.

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Susie Wood, Hammond and points along the St. Lawrence River

Our summer book group out on the river did a neat thing this year for the first meeting. We talked about books we’d read over the winter, rather than having an assigned book. Here are some of the books folks recommended:

• Any food books by Ruth Reichl.
• Matisse Stories, A.S. Byatt.
• Buffalo Soldier and Water Witches (especially), Chris Bohjalian.
• On Writing, Stephen King.
• Prodigal Summer, Barbara Kingsolver.
• Empire Falls, Richard Russo.
• Seasoned Timber, Dorothy Canfield Fisher.
• The Country of Pointed Firs, Sarah Orne Jewett.
• Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister and Wicked, Gregory McGuire.
• The Glass Palace, Amitav Ghosh.
• The Alexandrian Quartet, Lawrence Durell.

This summer, we’re reading from past NCPR booklists:

• Crow Lake, Mary Lawson.
• Small Wonder: Essays, Barbara Kingsolver.
• Stone by Stone: The Magnificent History in New England’s Stone Walls, Robert Thorson.
• The Life of Pi, Yann Martel.
• Servants of the Map, Andrea Barrett.

• Dalva, The Road Home and Off to the Side, Jim Harrison. All by the greatest American fiction writer alive. (The last is a recent memoir.) I regard Dalva as damn near a masterpiece.
• White Doves at Morning, James Lee Burke. The author has always written good suspense, but his latest effort is an historical novel about the Civil War.
• The Company of Strangers and (especially) A Small Death in Lisbon, Robert Wilson. If you are a LeCarre fan awaiting his next, try these.

• Man Walks Into a Room, Nicole Krauss. Fiction. About memory loss.
• Good Wives, Laurel Ulrich. About the history of wives.
• The Hydrogen Economy, Jeremy Rifkin. Oil-based economy compared to a hydrogen-based economy.
• The Threatening Storm, Kenneth M. Pollack. A business case for invading Iraq—not one iota of consideration for people.
• A Great Silly Grin, Humphrey Carpenter. Humor.
• Bet Your Life, Richard Dooling. Satirizes the insurance industry.
• Lord of Discipline, Pat Conroy. Or any of his other novels.
• The Captain, Jan De Hartog. Excellent book about a WWII tugboat captain.

• Uncle Tungsten: Memoirs of a Chemical Boyhood and Island of the Color Blind, Oliver Sachs. Both autobiographical. The first incorporates history of early chemistry—totally mesmerizing. The second incorporates elements of travel, medicine and botany. Riveting. The author is best known for his work on neurological cases, The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat.
• Elegy for Iris and Iris and Her Friends, John Bayley. My latest and greatest reading experience. These two accounts of the meeting, marriage and previous lives of Oxford professors Iris Murdoch, the famous British author, and her husband, John Bayley. Two brilliant and eccentric souls. The books are beautifully written, and together provide a matchless glimpse into two special lives.
• Unlce Bon’s in the Yukon and Other Shaggy Dog Stories, Daniel Pinkwater. A series of autobiographical vignettes in the offbeat life of author Daniel Pinkwater. Hilarious and sometimes poignant.
• The Old Patagonian Express: By Train Through the Americas, Paul Theroux. A thick, engrossing almost-diary of the author’s actual train trip as a young man, from a Boston rail station to the southernmost part of Argentina. Quirky and opinionated in outlook.
• Travels on a Donkey Through the Cervennes, Robert Louis Stevenson. This is a slim volume which takes the reader along on an actual trip made on foot by R.L.S. and his donkey, Modestine, through the rural villages of the Cevennes Mountains in France.
• I also recommend anything by Madeleine L’Engle (fiction for children and teens, autobiographical accounts and philosophical musings for adults). Anything by C.S. Lewis. And, the fiction of E.M.Forster and Thomas Hardy.

• Honor Lost: Love and Death in Modern-Day Jordan, Norma Khouri.

• Blessings, Anna Quindlen.

• Those Who Give, Rosemary Cania Maio. About the life of several teachers in an urban high school. The setting is education, but the themes of work ethic, sacrifice, apathy, frustration, idealism and more apply to every workplace.

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Decaflon: The grueling event of getting through the day consuming only things that are good for you.

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Mary Jane Glauber

• The Good Journey, Micaela Gilchrist. One of those books that I could not put down. The author did a lot of research into the history of the opening up of the midwest for white settlers, and she has skillfully interwoven a true personal story from Mary Bullitt’s diary into this fictional love and mystery story.  Set in the 1830s.
• Clay’s Quilt, Silas House. An excellent first novel set in the Applachians of Eastern Kentucky. Another one I could not put down.
• Bel Canto, Ann Patchett. I liked this book because it made me look at things in a different way.
• A Girl Named Zippy, Haven Kimmel. Fun and entertaining from start to finish. A memoir of growing up in a small Indiana town. Plenty of universal truths of childhood.

• The Seven Daughters of Eve, Bryan Sykes. I was skeptical of the usual hype on the book jacket: “A lovely, rollicking book, direct and clear…” How could a book about science that reveals our genetic ancestry be “rollicking”? Not exactly rollicking, but the book is fun to read. The author makes it a story of adventure and discovery.
• Dustin Smith, NYC/Occasional north country visitor
• The Essays of Ralph Waldo Emerson, RW Emerson.
• Mythologies, Roland Barthes.

As grandmother of two adopted Chinese girls, I have been reading some books about China.

• River Town, Peter Hessler. The author went to China to teach and his book is a beautifully written story that sheds light on the people and their feelings, as well as the beauty of the country.

• Once Upon A Town, Bob Greene. A fairly new, wee book about a 24/7 WWII canteen for the troop trains that came through North Platte, Nebraska. Terrific!

• My Dream of You, Nuala O’Faolain.

• At Swim, Two Boys, Jamie O’Neill. A poignant story with two teen-age boys at its center, set in Ireland in 1915-16. Heart is a key word for this book—it has plenty of heart. The growing friendship between the two boys, which has a sexual component, is handled with extreme gentleness and delicacy. I loved it: re-read it to savor it a second time.
• Bel Canto, Ann Patchett. The author creates an irresistable reality that feels timeless and places the reader squarely inside. To read this book is to have the experience of living in the present moment.

• Elle and Bad News of the Heart, Douglas Glover. The Canadian author has been twice-nominated for Canada’s Governor General’s Award. The first title is his latest—an historical novel, set among the French nobility. The second title is his much acclaimed collection of stories. The author has taught at upstate NY and Vermont colleges, and hosted a book program on WAMC in Albany.

Here are a few titles which make great reading any time of year, and for summer visitors and residents alike, the books will help them take a look at the unique place they reside. The books all have to do with Adirondack born writer/model/editor-and-more Jeanne Robert Foster.

• Neighbors of Yesterday, Jeanne Robert Foster. First published in 1916, republished in 1963 and again last year by Locust Hill Press thanks to the efforts of former Potsdam State English professor Richard Londraville and his wife Janis.
• Adirondack Portraits: A Piece of Time, Jeanne Robert Foster. Published posthumously in 1986. It contains many interesting portraits/poems about the people and places Jeanne knew when she was growing up.
• Dear Yeats, Dear Pound, Dear Ford, Richard Londraville, Janis Londraville. A biography of Foster, published two years ago by Syracuse University Press.

These are books you can read and re-read and then think about the people you know in your own neighborhood.

(Ed.’s note: Don’t miss Eileen’s performance of Foster’s work, touring around the Adirondack North Country this summer and fall.)

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Glibido: All talk and no action.

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Jackie Pray

• Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress, Sijie Dai. Set in China during the Cultural Revolution. Two teenage boys are banished to a backward mountain village to be re-educated because their parents are intellectuals. It’s a hard life. But the two discover that a boy in another village has a forbidden treasure—a suitcase full of books! Very short, beautifully told story.
• Dancer, Colum McCann. A “re-imagined” life of the great dancer Rudolph Nureyev, told by the people around him—from his first dance teacher in the industrial town of his youth to his dance partners, rivals and lovers. A hundred voices tell his story from a hundred different perspectives. Rich, breathtaking prose. Absolutely sumptuous writing—whether the topic is war, dance, debauchery or Nureyev’s feet!
• 47th Street Black, Bayo Ojikutu. Ojikutu—truly an incendiary new voice in literature—tells the tall of the passing of power from the Italian gangsters to the black gangsters on the South Side of Chicago in the 1960s. Forget politically correct language and behavior. Be ready for violence, electrifying prose and insightful social history.
• To the Lighthouse, Virginia Woolf. Makes vividly clear what all the fuss is about Virginia Woolf. A family summerhouse before WWI is the setting. Little actually happens—an afternoon at the shore, dinner, the return years later of an older, more cynical family. But it’s Woolf’s ability to reveal the complex emotions behind mundane exchanges that puts a searing hand on the soul. Not to be missed. Not to be forgotten.

• The Prime Minister, Phineas Redux and The Eustace Diamonds, Anthony Trollope. The political novels.
• No More Parades, Ford Madox Ford. Amost quit, stuck with it and am glad I did. Of historical interest but view of war from “the inside” good for the whole thing ever since Troy.
• The Apprentice, Jacques Pepin. The geniality and Mediterranean ebullience of the person is even better than the food.
• Disgrace, J.M.Coetzee. Philosophical about sexual and other aspects of morality by a questioning, independent thoughtful person. For me, a good example of not “liking” the author yet liking the experience of having read the book. Set in South Africa.
• I reread the Bronte sisters, Wuthering Hieghts and Jane Eyre. They really are as great as the high school teachers urged us to believe and we were too dumb really to “get.”

• I’m sure Montrealer Yann Martell’s Life of Pi is on your list, but it is a superb book on tape, read by Jeff Woodman, whose South Indian accent is great. You catch subtle funny things because of his delivery that a ready may overlook.

• Fortune’s Rock and Sea Glass, Anita Shreve.
• Winterkill, C.J. Box.
• Cane River, Lalita Tademy.
• Burning Marguerite, Elizabeth Inness Brown.
• The Color of Water, James McBride.
• A Lesson Before Dying, Ernest J. Gaines.
• The Secret Life of Bees, Sue Monk Kidd.

• Risky Business, Dave Barry.
• Jackdaws and Hornet Flight, Ken Follett. Certainly meet my definition of summer reading.
• Dark Eagle, John Ensor Harr. An historical novel about Benedict Arnold, paints a sympathetic picture of this tragic character in our history. Stories of battles on Lake Champlain and Lake George add local interest.
• Carry Me Home, John DelVecchio.
• A Map of the World, Jane Hamilton.
• East of the Mountain, David Guterson.
• Blessings, Anna Quindlen.
• The Smoke Jumper, Nicholas Evans.

A porch, a deck, a beach, a boat
A hammock, a chaise, a blanket, a cushion
A breeze, a storm, the sun, becalmed
A jug, a glass, a cooler, a bottle
A book, the paper, a mag, a chart
Ah, summer reading!

• The Piano Tuner, Daniel Mason. Just finished this sort of mystical yarn in the tradition of Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, set in colonial Burma in the 1880s where a Kurtz-like figure, a Surgeon Major in Her Majesty’s Army, at the isolated outpost is having success taming the locals with, of all things, Western music peformed on an esoteric grand piano. But has he “gone native” in the process? Finding that out is the implicit agenda of the piano tuner of the title. What really gets tuned? That’s the tale.
• What I Loved, Siri Justevedt. The author is the wife of Paul Auster. Her book is a subtle and sad love story bolstered by an interesting description of the contemporary New York City art world.

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Dopeler effect: The tendency of stupid ideas to seem smarter when they come at you rapidly.

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Chris Dunn, Potsdam

• The main one you won’t find in bookstores, but may be on shelves of some library you’re lucky enough to live near. If so, you can read about “Life in the Cannibal Islands”; you can experience (almost) “The Wonders of the Yellowstone”—five years before Custer’s defeat, too—or read a report on “Breakfast with Alexandre Dumas”; or, go for an adventure in Imperial Japan. There’s a long tale by Hans Christian Andersen; and, any number of articles on scientific and literary subjects of great interest—in 1871.
• Well, what I’m getting to is the big, heavy 1971 printing of Scribner’s Monthly magazine, January-December 1871. This was a magazine of high quality, and very popular in its time. It’s all in one volume: heavy, and something near 1,000 pages.

And these:

• God’s Secretaries, Adam Nicholson. A fine study of the creation of the King James Bible, just published: how a committee created a great work of literature. For anyone who loves language, I think it shouldn’t be missed.
• Wee Free Men, Terry Prachett. A new discworld story. Like all and any of his it should be sought out.
• The Space Child’s Mother Goose, frederick Winsor and Marian Perry (illustrator). Published in 1958 and just reissued. It’s clever (even witty) and funny and generally charming, and in hardly any way outdated. Recommended for pure fun. Here are some excerpts:

Little Bo-Peep
Has lost her sheep,
The radar has failed to find them.
They’ll all, face to face,
Meet in parallel space,
Proceeding their leaders behind them.

Or,

Probable-Possible, my black hen
She lays eggs in the Relative When.
She doesn’t lay eggs in the Positive Now
Because she’s unable to Postulate How.

And,

Orientable planes
Their stresses and strains—
And my story is well on its way;
An erudite thesis
On Psychokinesis
And that will be all for today.

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FROM LISTENERS WE HEARD FROM DURING THE CALL-IN

Art, Burlington

• The Dive From Clausen’s Pier, Ann Packer.
• The Romantics: A Novel, Pankaj Mishra.
• The Story of My Father: A Memoir, Sue Miller.
• Good Morning, Midnight: Life and Death in the Wild, Chip Brown. A portrait of the enigmatic outdoorsman, Guy Waterman.

• Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everyting Your American History Textbook Got Wrong, James Loewen.

• Featherstone: A Novel, Kirsty Gunn.
• In the Absence of Men, Philippe Besson, Frank Wynne.
• The Marriage of the Sea: A Novel, Jane Alison.
• The Probable Future, Alice Hoffman.
• Wintering: A Novel of Sylvia Plath, Kate Moses.
• Il Gigante: Michelangelo, Florence, and the David 1492-1504, Anton Gill.

• The Map That Changed the World: William Smith and the Birth of Modern Geology, Simon Winchester.
• In the Memory of the Forest: A Novel, Charles T. Powers.

• Collected Stories, Joseph Mitchell.
• Technics & Civilization, Lewis Mumford.

• Krakatoa: The Day the World Exploded, August 27, 1883, Simon Winchester.
• The Twenty-one Balloons, William Pene du Bois. A children’s book.

• Voyage of the Narwhal, Andrea Barrett.
• Anil’s Ghost, Michael Ondaatje.

• Sinister Pig, Tony Hillerman.
• Every Drop for Sale: Our Desperate Battle Over Water, Jeffrey Rothfeder.

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Beelzebug: Satan in the form of a mosquito that gets into your bedroom at 3 in the morning and cannot be cast out.

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Jane, Jericho, VT

• A Fine Kind of Madness: Mountain Adventures Tall and True, Laura Waterman and Guy Waterman.
• Burning Marguerite, Elizabeth Inness-Brown.
• The Secret Life of Bees, Sue Monk Kidd.
• The Colour, Rose Tremain.
• The Piano Tuner, Daniel Mason.
• Among Stone Giants: The Life of Katherine Routledge and Her Remarkable Expedition to Easter Island, Jo Anne Van Tilburg.
• Easter Island, Jennifer Vanderbes. A novel.

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A FEW FROM THE VOICES YOU HEAR ON NPR AND OTHER NATIONALLY-PRODUCED PROGRAMS

Christopher Lyden, Host of The Whole Wide World

Lyden suggests these titles to expand on his series about globalization and related issues:

• Globalization and Its Discontents, Joseph Stiglitz.
• The Lexus and the Olive Tree, Tom Friedman.
• Development as Freedom, Amartya Sen.
• Jihad vs. McWorld, Benjamin Barber.
• No Logo, Naomi Klein.

In learning about the world consciousness out there, I have revelled in a marvelous website (originating at the National University of Singapore) on Post-Colonial Literature: http://www.postcolonialweb.org/

Jamaica prompted my own course of post-colonial reading with these titles:

• Beyond a Boundary, C.L.R. James. A masterpiece, using his beloved game of cricket as a metaphor of everything good and bad in the legacy of empire. James led my reading backward to Thackery, Dickens, Conrad, Kipling and Maugham, and forward to people like the Cuban novelist, Alejo Carpentier, the Dominican Junot Diaz, the Somalian Nuruddin Farah, the dreaded V.S. Naipaul, the vital Edward Said, the “beyond category” Zadie Smith.

Contemporary writers are a huge part of my travelling education, and some of them have become real friends, like Kwadwo Opoku Agyemang in Ghana, Colin Channer in Jamaica, and Philip Jeyaretnam in Singapore. The new joy of my reading is Amin Maalouf, a French-Lebanese novelist, historian and brilliant illuminator of the identity riddle.

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And, the pick of The Washington Post’s Style Invitational Contest:

Ignoranus: A person who’s both stupid and an asshole.

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Susan Stamberg, NPR Special Correspondent

• Embers, Sandor Marai. It’s a brilliant, short novel written in Budapest in 1942 and only recently translated into English. It’s a tour de force about love, life, and the end of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
• Bel Canto, Ann Patchett. Another favorite. A PEN/Faulkner Fiction Award-winner.
• Liane Hansen, NPR Host for Weekend Edition Sunday
• The Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, Michael Chabon. The best book I’ve read in the past year.

• Baudolino, Umberto Eco. The newest novel from Eco. His writing has always been smart—sometimes a little too smart for his own good. While Baudolino is set in medieval Europe, like earlier works, you don’t have to know the history of the Knights Templar or read Latin to get throug this one. There’s quite a bit of history, but it’s simply woven into a wonderful narrative. It’s convincing and entertaining storytelling. I may have to read it again this summer, I liked it so much.

Thanks to all who contributed to this list. Contact Ellen Rocco year-round with your recommended reading:

Ellen Rocco
North Country Public Radio
St. Lawrence University
Canton, NY 13617

ellen@ncpr.org

Visit North Country Public Radio on line for updated lists and Readers & Writers on the Air program schedules: www.ncpr.org/readers