Book Report

[stormkeeper_lovesall]

 
A new book report already?? This might be record time for me, but I can say that the Tokyo Rose and Edward Tulane books were pretty short.

 

Let Us Descend by Jesmyn Ward – I listened to this on audio, a fictional account of an enslaved woman in the American South who is separated from her mother and who sometimes sees an apparition, her deceased grandmother who was a warrior in Africa before being enslaved. Ward’s descriptions would rival any poet’s. Since I listened to this on audio, I wasn’t really able to jot down any phrases so you’ll have to take my word that each paragraph of this book is bursting with vivid, intense, innovative turns of phrase. (You want to learn to write more descriptively, read this)!  Needless to say, given the subject matter, the book is brutal. So many horrific moments and it’s hard to pick one. But here’s one that stuck with me: there is a brief mention to a male slave who’d been chained and drowned on a long march from Georgia and Louisiana – and how he’d been a gardener and who’d kept the garden looking good even in winter. Sold off, marched to his death, like he was nothing. (His captors weren’t intending to drown him but they made a bunch of chained men cross a river, and this man was quite a bit shorter than the others and lost his footing). A million other heartbreaking moments like that. Grade: 8

 

Juniper & Thorn by Ava Reid – So, this was not my usual genre. It’s historical fiction, which I love, but it’s also got horror and witchcraft and it’s also a re-telling of a fairytale. Despite it not being my usual thing, it was easy to stick with because the author’s writing was so good. Just like the above book, there were so many stunning metaphors. (Maybe I should purchase both books and just page through them like I do with poetry books, to improve my own writing)! Grade: 5 (Excellent writing, just didn’t care for the genre)

 

Tokyo Rose: Zero Hour by Andrew Frattino with illustrations by Kate Kasenow – A graphic novel telling the story of Iva Toguri. She was one of several women during World War II who took on the role of “Tokyo Rose”, transmitting Japanese propaganda with the purpose of demoralizing American troops. Most Tokyo Roses got away with it, but Toguri didn’t. And sadly, there is more to her story than that; she was functioning as a double agent and was actually trying to help the US troops. She was an American citizen who’d been visiting relatives in Japan and caught there when the war broke out. The US’s own reports showed that troop morale went up after her broadcasts. Anyway, I love that the writer rescued her from a footnote of history and showed us her life. Grade: 7

 

The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane by Kate DiCamillo – Recently I listened to an Ann Patchett book on audio, and she recommended this book, so I checked it out. It’s ostensibly a children’s book but there’s much more to it than that. This is the story of a rabbit doll made of china. He lives the way many children assume their stuffed animals live: fully conscious and with his own personality. He can’t move or speak but he thinks and lives. His first owner loses him when some bullies toss Edward overboard a ship, and it becomes clear that Edward has no control over what befalls him, and he misses love. It was a lovely little tale with a big message. Grade: 6

 

We Need to Build by Eboo Patel – Sometimes it’s good to mentally debate the author of a book, and I did that a lot with this one. It’s a handbook for activists, from a man who has worked to bring people of different religions together and to use that to build for transformative healing. Patel spends a lot of the book criticizing progressives. Some of his criticisms do have merit. But also I’m willing to bet that progressives are the bulk of his audience and I don’t know if constantly scolding them here accomplishes much. I want to say “You think left-wing college students protesting by disrupting someone’s speech is bad? Wait till you read about what MAGA people did on January 6!” Also, come on, protests have been known to happen on college campuses and that’s okay. Patel also praises the things religions has accomplished, and some of it certainly is legit. But he mentions Catholic hospitals as an example, and I shudder to think of how they have failed to provide women with reproductive care. Patel’s a cishet dude – how would he feel if he needed a urologist or had prostate cancer and was told by the Catholic hospitals that he praises that they don’t treat men’s private parts. (Or that they provide as much care to men's reproductive health as they do to women's). As I reflect on this book, I just don’t know if there’s much in here that a dozen activists haven’t written about before. Build bridges. Don’t cancel people. Work towards the world you want instead of screaming against the world you hate. Talk to the people and groups you want to help instead of assuming you know all the answers.  It was pretty engaging even despite its flaws. Grade: 6

Comments

[nytshd3]

Yay for all these books!!

Let Us Descend sounds so hard and heartbreaking, ugh. Sometimes the amazing writing is even better when it has a good audiobook reader, so that's really nice.

Interesting about Juniper & Thorn, I feel like I may have heard of it? Maybe it was popular online? I don't follow a lot of book accounts, but I do see some pop up now and then on instagram.

I feel like there was a show I saw recently about the "Tokyo Rose" women. Rollin and I sometimes watch some of those 'mysteries at the museum' shows that tell stories like that, I feel like it might have been that.

The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane sounds good!

Wait, he's complaining about protests happening on college campuses? Like this is a brand new phenomenon? How many vietnam war protests happened on college campuses? Yeesh. Also, yuck on the Catholic hospitals thing. I will say that there are some philanthropic services that Catholic Charities provides that can really help people (the priest who married my parents and my brother and sister in law runs a program through Catholic Charities that is intended to help support people who have lost a loved one to suicide). But Catholic hospitals, yikes, one group of Catholic hospitals was trying to get us to add a section to our contract with them that said that we would abide by Catholic rules and regulations. Like, no, dude, that's a you guys thing, plus, who is the decider of that? Cuz I know you ain't calling the pope if we have a disagreement.

Thanks for sharing as always :)

[stormkeeper_lovesall]

It is true; religion isn't all bad, as you said and as Patel definitely wanted to point out.

One other interesting thing from his book. He's making the point that progressives need to listen to the communities of color they often try to speak for. He gave the example of Chicago Public Schools being closed/remote for a loooong time due to COVID, compared to "red state" schools, and he mentioned that most students of CPS are black or brown. He's right. But it wasn't just white progressives wanting to keep classes remote due to COVID. He skips over the politics between the Chicago Teachers' Union and the City of Chicago - which have been at all-out war for a while :) Like the union was a way bigger factor in this than any hordes of white progressives demanding the schools stay remote.