My Salinger Year Joanna Rakoff

Lets be clear, this is not a memoir specifically about J. D. Salinger, nor another sordid tale of having had an affair with him (thank goodness)–this is a memoir of a young woman working at his literary agency in the mid 1990’s.

Alright I can hear your yawns from here, but I’m always interested in the inner workings of the publishing industry and so I decided to read this memoir by Joanna Rakoff.

It’s the mid 1990’s and Joanna is 23 years old, and much like in The Devil Wears Prada, she really has no experience or interest in publishing but is thrilled to land an “assistant” position at a literary agency – referred to as “The Agency”.  This is one of those classy but underpaid positions that presumably one can brag about at dinner parties.  Ms. Rakoff has never read anything by Salinger and she thinks when agency staff refer to “Jerry”, their star client, they mean Jerry Seinfield.  In fact “Jerry” is their code name for J. D.  (Jerome David) Salinger, the notoriously reclusive author.

This is an old-school literary agency.  Here is a world of richly carpeted offices, no overhead florescent lighting — just shaded lamps, messengers, martini lunches and book-shelved lined hallways.  Computers are only whispered about by the staff.

Joanna is given strict orders to never give out any information on Salinger and the agency must protect his privacy at all costs.  Joanna’s main job is to answer Salinger’s many fan letters with a simple but curt form letter:

“Dear ___________
Many thanks for your recent letter to J.D. Salinger. As you may know, Mr. Salinger does not wish to receive mail from his readers. Thus, we cannot pass your kind note on to him. We thank you for you interest in Mr. Salinger’s books.

Best,  The Agency”

Her boss insists that Joanna type these letters out individually on a Selectric typewriter (using carbon paper) in order to give the fans a sense that an actual agency person has written back to them.  Joanna must also answer her boss’s phone and if “Jerry”calls she is to keep it short and take a detailed message.

Joanna’s personal life is a mess, she lives with a ghastly boyfriend in a run-down apartment with no heat or a kitchen sink (?).  She has, for no explanation, left the guy she really loves and he fled to California.  Her parents have presented her with all her college bills unexpectedly unpaid and used her credit cards to rack up debt that Joanna must some how pay down.  She’s broke financially and in her heart, so the agency is her only solace as Joanna is a lover of books, an avid reader and an aspiring poet.

There’s this lovely quote

 On authors: The strange wonder of powerful writing, engaged in like some act of reflective devotion, and then, sent out, as on the wind, to find some home with unknown readers who in turn receive this revelation and transformation. Literature not as `escape’, literature as engagement.

It’s fun when Joanna steers away from the standard form letter and tries writing personal letters to the Salinger fans – with disastrous results.  She hopes to become an agent and dips into the agency slush pile, finds an unknown author and tries to get her published.  Also in the end, Joanna actually meets Salinger when he make a rare appearance at the agency offices.

That, my friends is about all that was interesting about this memoir. I’ve just saved you the chore of reading it yourselves.   I did find some interesting parts about the inner workings of a literary agency – especially the care and feeding of Salinger himself.    The grand event of finally getting one office computer for everyone to share was amusing and there’s some sly literary name dropping.   This memoir covers a entire year of Ms. Rakoff’s life and it felt equally long to make it through this slow and overly-detailed story.  One of the professional reviewers mentioned that this memoir started out as a much shorter magazine story and perhaps it should have stayed in that form.

Advanced review copy provided by Alfred A. Knopf

 

 

 

 

Small Blessings by Martha Woodroof

Small Blessings follows the intertwined lives of academics and their family members in a small Southern college town. 

The above synopsis almost made me pass on this novel – sounded slightly mundane and I’m not a fan of academia novels.

Then, one Saturday morning,  I heard Ms. Woodroof interviewed on NPR (she is a staff writer for NPR) and I warmed to her voice, attitude and that she’s a debut novelist at 67 years of age.  (Approaching said decade myself, I seek any and all such bright, uplifting statistics, if you please)

I remembered I had Small Blessings on my Kindle and turned the first pages that evening — still convinced it would be a predictable read.

Yes, at first this is your average story:  In a small, sleepy college town Tom Putnam, an English professor with a mentally troubled wife, is flatly going about his life when suddenly there is Rose, a lovely new employee of the campus bookstore. Tom and his wife are charmed by Rose and make plans for dinner.

Still thinking oh yes, a Lifetime movie plot is about to unwind, I carried on and wham! The story suddenly twists and turns.  The characters become wholly unpredictable…and I found myself turning the pages and falling headlong into Ms. Woodroof’s atmospheric story.

Without giving away too much, Tom’s poor wife dies in an auto accident during the first few chapters, his mother-in-law, Agnes (my favorite character) becomes his ally.  Tom falls a little bit more in love with Rose each day.  At the same time, a past affair brings him Henry, a 10-year old boy, who may (or may not) be his son.  Stir all this up with oddball (often drunk) supporting characters, a Southern town that knows everyone’s secrets, some melodrama and you’re in for a journey.

The campus atmosphere is beautifully rendered in an insulated Southern setting, but Ms. Woodroof also slyly lampoons the institution’s pretenses.  The front lawns of the faculty housing are beautifully maintained for showing off to prospective students and parents, while the back yards grow weedy dependent on the faculty to tend – which they don’t.

I had my quibbles with Small Blessings. I found Tom Putnam to be almost catatonic in his passiveness, perhaps as an academic, he lives in his head – but at times I found it very irritating – especially in his marriage to Marjory:    “Conscience was such a delicate balancing act.  There was what he knew was right, what he ought to think was right, and what he wanted to do, all to be considered.  It was the ultimate moral chess match, and it was the only game that mismatched married people got to play.”

The mental illness and death of Tom’s wife, Marjory are treated with a light, almost cavalier hand – as in this from Agnes, her mother:   “Marjory is, I really do think, better off dead.  I don’t know what dead is, of course, but it’s got to be more fun than my daughter’s life was.”  and this later quote  “the best thing she ever did in life was to give up on it.  And that’s a bleak as a life can get.”

In the end, I found this an unpredictably candid and real storyline.  Small Blessings teeters on the edge of soap-opera stereotype, but then surprises the reader with realism. The characters are flawed but ultimately loved.  This is a story full of tragic events but it overflows with optimism.  One of my favorite quotes:  “When the going gets tough, the tough suck it up,” Agnes said. “The rest get run over.”

The outline of this novel screams “make me a TV movie!”, but if it is optioned, I hope they capture the story’s quirks and messiness.

Review copy provided by St. Martin’s Press via NetGalley.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I Like Big Books — I Can Not Lie

I love me a big ole historical novel, especially if it’s steeped in a mystery, set in an old house with an abandoned garden and filled with colorful and compelling characters.  Kate Morton has written four such big, addictive books, of which I’ve only read two…but don’t worry her other two are not far behind on my list.  I read the first book several years ago and just finished the second.

The House at Riverton, by Kate Morton

98 year old Grace tells her story to a young film maker documenting an unexplained death at Riverton House where Grace served as a maid 80 years before.  Told in alternating narratives between past and present, I was in this book’s clutches after just a few pages.

Grace serves as maid to Hannah and Emmeline, two distinctly different sisters who are creepily close to one another. Grace is drawn into the the spoiled sisters web of deceit and secret games.   And in 1924 Riverton and its inhabitants are shattered with a shocking suicide on the grounds.  All the characters are vibrant and amply developed — there are dysfunctional aristocratic family members with a range of servants, each with their own foibles.  And then there’s the glorious manor house of Riverton– a character in itself.

Often flashback narrative can be clunky. This is flashback done brilliantly.  Deaths, affairs, missteps are reminisced by Grace telling her story, then the book seamlessly transports the reader back in time to Riverton and you’re there and it’s happening now.

Ms. Morton excels at period research and her attention to detail is superb. Other reviewers remarked that her historical detail bogged down the book, but I wholly disagree.  I found the description of the table settings, the details of dressing for dinner, the lavish picnics all added to the richness of the story.

This is a long, sweeping story of class structure and struggle, betrayals, secrets and the devastation of WWI. I was glued throughout its wonderful twists and turns until the gasp-worthy ending.  A big enchanting book to fill many a long winter evening.

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 The Forgotten Garden, by Kate Morton

This is a classic fairy tale story:  a little girl is abandoned on a ship bound for Australia.  She hits her head while on the ship and looses her memory.  All she has with her is a suitcase with a few clothes and a book of dark fairy tales written by a woman she remembers as the Authoress . Once in Australia, a dock worker and his wife take her in, name her Nell and raise her.  Once the girl comes of age, she is told of her rightful identity and she returns to England to discover her people and her story.  

Her travels lead her to Blackhurst Manor and she starts to unravel the Mountrachet family’s secrets.  She purchases a run down cottage and garden on their property makes it liveable, and carves out a life for herself.  While Nell is still trying to solve the mystery of her past, her distraught daughter shows up, dumping her granddaughter Cassandra on her doorstep–permanently. Two generations later, the granddaughter Cassandra inherits the cottage and tries to discover her secrets.  Sounds trite — Yes and No.

Ms. Morton takes a fairly well-worn story and weaves it into a rich and compelling story which spans generations, and multiple plots wherein secrets are kept and betrayals are just below the surface.  While the English cottage and forgotten garden setting are idyllic (there’s even a maze and a Dickensian-like shop in the village) life is more difficult here and this is a darker story complete with poverty, sickness and workhouses.

At first, I was less enthralled with The Forgotten Garden and found it more difficult to keep the three perspectives and three time periods straight…I kept having to go back a few chapters to figure out where I was.  Also Ms. Morton uses very similar names – Blackhurst Estate, Mrs. Blackwell and Mr. Blackwater  (whoa I’m confused…).  Luckily, by the time I’d read 5 or 6 chapters,  things flowed more clearly and I was once again hooked to the end by this marvelous author and her writing.    

In an interview, Ms. Morton admitted to a fondness of 19th century Gothic novels and her novels are indeed reminiscent of Daphne du Maurier, or even perhaps even Upstairs Downstairs and Downton Abbey. 

 Her next two books – The Distant Hours and The Secret Keeper happily await me on my shelf.  Call me fool and shut the door because obviously I’m a fan.

 

The Big Tiny by Dee Williams

Square Feet: 84. Possessions: 305.*

(*This headline is from the NY Times review – I had to swipe it.)

January is my time for sorting through clothes and books, cleaning out the freezer and diving into those mystery boxes under the stairs.   By necessity, we are already fairly simplified given our 1,100 sq. ft row house  — but after reading this inspirational memoir — we got nothing on Dee Williams.  

Ms. Williams decided to build an eighty-four-square-foot house on wheels, by herself — as a way to start building a simpler more meaningful life. 

This authentic memoir tells of her challenges both building-wise and health-wise.  She is not an experienced builder, but knows her way around tools, so she ventures ahead after meeting and studying others in the “tiny house” movement.  It’s not enough that she is dealing with a newly diagnosed heart condition and is often disabled and hospitalized, she also experiences grimace-worthy mishaps.  She glues her hair into the siding, almost shears off her ear when some plywood catches on an earring, tries to secure the roof (in flip flops!) and falls from her sleeping loft when the ladder shifts out from under her.

But beyond the Three-Stooges-like mishaps, this is a book to inspire.  How can you not be impressed (and perhaps even envious) of someone who can list everything she owns on one sheet of paper (the handwritten list is reproduced in the book).  Also enviable, Ms. Williams can clean her entire house in ten minutes and her monthly bills run approximately eight dollars.  Granted, she is living in a friend’s back yard and using this friends water, laundry and shower.  But Ms. Williams has her own kitchen (one burner),  her own toilet (compostable) and a sleeping loft with a view of the stars – risky ladder notwithstanding.

I was fascinated at Ms. Williams perseverance in the face of many hurdles — obstructive city codes, a newly prescribed oxygen contraption that meant snaking a breathing tube from a outside generator into her house, and an aging dog that she carries up and down the sleeping loft ladder.  But she remains positive and loving throughout. 

Happily, the author is also quirky and likeable, she still lusts after things she doesn’t need at Target (I have the same problem, I blame the hypnotic bulls-eye logo), she delights in fun underwear and prefers flip flops to shoes.  There is also a quiet soulfulness throughout, the reader is aware that Ms. Williams has a degenerative disease.  She writes with a quiet grace about her newly acquired time to savor every moment — as in this quote.

I stumbled into a new sort of ‘happiness’, one that didn’t hinge on always getting what I want but rather, on wanting what I have. It’s the kind of happiness that isn’t tied so tightly to being comfortable (or having money and property), but instead is linked to a deeper sense of satisfaction – to a sense of humility and gratitude, and a better understanding of who I am in my heart. I found a certain bigness in my little house – a sense of largeness, freedom, and happiness that comes when you see there’s no place else you’d rather be.

This book could have used some strong editing, it does ramble off the tracks, but it should provoke all of us to think on the question “how much is enough?”.  Given America’s self storage business is a $25-billion a year industry, Ms. Williams experiences are an inspiration. This book is not so much of a “how-to” guide but a “why to” memoir.   While not everyone (not me – see below) is suited to such an extremely tiny house, this book will make you contemplate the “too much stuff” syndrome  — why not simplify, declutter and live smaller?

N.B. Living in such a small space alone may be one thing, but can you image two people in 84 square feet?  I’m definitely not a candidate.  No way I’m making the middle of the night climbs up and down a sleeping loft ladder, I’d be lost without my book collection, I’d sorely miss my tea pots and at the very least — my husband and I already experience too much “togetherness” now we’re both retired — so count me out …. but I must go now and clean out a closet or two.  

Advanced reading copy provided by Penguin Group via NetGalley.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

By the Book edited by Pamela Paul

By the Book:  Writers on Literature and the Literary Life from the New York Times Book Review

 

My friend Reiko saves me her Sunday NY Times Book Review section and gives me a big stack of them whenever we get together. We laugh because we can judge how long it’s been since we’ve seen each other by the size of the accumulation.

One of my favorite sections of the NY Times Book Review is called “By the Book”, wherein a writer is interviewed about their reading.  Each week we get a view into writers favorite books & writers, reading habits, their personal book collection, early childhood reads, etc.

The top interviews are gathered in this one book and while there’s nothing new here, I found it engrossing to read through them.  At almost 300 pages and 65 writers interviewed it’s no quick read.  I’ve been slowly savoring this book, making my way through this fascinating collection, underlining and making long lists of newly recommended books to read (like I really need more lists of books to read).

Included in the collection are interviews with the expected writers such as Anna Quindlen and John Irving, but also included are Sting and Arnold Schwarzenegger?  (The question mark is mine.)  But don’t let that dissuade you, this is a fascinating look at writers and their life with books. And, hey guess what? — the Arnold interview reveals he is surprisingly insightful.

When more than three of the authors listed the Patrick Melrose novels by Edward St. Aubyn as their favorites, I had to add them to my list.   It was also comforting to see that several writers also found the classics tough going – Dickens, Tolstoy etc. 

You’ll discover the vulnerabilities of some writers — who knew Hilary Mantel actively reads self help books or Anne Lamott secretly likes People and US Weekly?

Many writers are delightfully unpretentious in their reading choices.  Jhumpa Lahiri states:  I am drawn to any story that makes me want to read from one sentence to the next.  I have no other criterion.  And Scott Turow,  The only unfailing criterion is that I can hitch my heart to the imagined world and read on.  My favorite quote is from Isabel Allende.  A good novel or short story is like making love between clean ironed sheets: total pleasure.

Hilary Mantel wishes for a magic tablecloth to appear with dinner all prepared so she can have more time to read.  Sting has kept every book he’s ever read and doesn’t lend books. Scott Turow admits to “reading at” a book, putting it down and then months later picking it up and diving in with enormous enthusiasm. 

Jeanette Walls lists her favorite memoirs, which is like getting a food critics top restaurants.

And there’s lots of chuckles:   under “The last book that made you cry” – Jeffery Eugenides answers The South Beach Diet. 

Then there’s this:  James Patterson talks about his first Alex Cross book, “Along Came a Spider.” He said a movie studio would have optioned the book early on in his career, when he could have really used the money  –all he had to do was make Alex Cross a white man.

 I don’t recommend reading this book all at once.  Like the original interviews, it’s best to savor one or two at a time. 

Also this book should come with a warning:  Reading this book will increase your to-be-read wish list exponentially and may cause unbridled book purchases.   

Advanced Readers Copy provided by Henry Holt & Co.

 

 

 

A Tale of Two Covers

Two Days Until Christmas

Christmas Stories – Everyman’s Pocket Classics

I picked this up years ago at the library book sale – attracted by the pretty cover and because I’m fond of the Everyman’s editions, so handsomely done and always with sewn-in ribbon bookmarks (I’m such a sucker for those).  These small volumes always have this quote on their frontpiece:

Everyman, I will go with thee and be thy guide, in thy most need to go by thy side.

They really “get” bibliophiles and our most needs to always have a book by our side.

Christmas Stories is a treasury of short fiction by great writers of the past two centuries—including Dickens and Tolstoy to John Updike and Alice Munro. As a literary subject, Christmas has inspired everything from intimate domestic dramas to fanciful flights of the imagination, and the full range of its expression is represented in this wonderfully engaging anthology.

Admittedly, until this year I had only read a the first few stories – all Christmas classics, O’Henry, Dickens and Willa Cather’s delightful The Burglar’s Christmas (I never miss a chance to re-read that one) but last night I delved into the back of this collection and read two short stories that left me really quite depressed.  One by Richard Ford about a dispirited dysfunctional family on a ski vacation and then Alice Munro uses two workers to deliver a character study as they dismember turkeys at a slaughterhouse Ugh.  I had to make a cup of sleepytime tea just to get the bad taste out of my mouth.

So, I’m putting this charming looking book on trial, and will read a few more to determine its fate as a coveted member of my Christmas Books Collection.

 

A Literary Christmas – An Anthology from The British Library

From the fly leaf:  A Literary Christmas is a seasonal compendium that collects poems, short stories, and prose by some of the greatest poets and writers in the English language. Like Charles Dickens’s Ghosts of Christmas Past and Present, the selections featured here are representative of times old and new. Readers will enjoy a convivial Christmas Day with Samuel Pepys, Anthony Trollope, George Eliot, and Nancy Mitford; venture out into the snow in the company of Jane Austen, Henry James, and Charles Dickens’s ever-popular Mr. Pickwick; and warm up by the fire with the seasonal tales of Dylan Thomas, Kenneth Grahame, and Oscar Wilde.

This awful cover is proof that I shouldn’t be lured by a pretty one (see above) — this is a joyful collection of stories, poems, carols, essays and illustrations.  The editors cleverly organized the book in such categories as  “Before Christmas”, “Snow and Ice” and “Christmas Fare”.  

Look, here’s Samuel Pepys Christmas Day diary entry from 1662 and a treatise on a doctor-prescribed diet just before Christmas by P.G. Wodehouse.  An except from Cider with Rosie (an English coming of age classic) and Washington Irving’s description of a grand Christmas dinner.  Something for everyone in this lovely book.

Here’s a sample of some of the illustrations within (click to enlarge):

 

 

 

 

 

So the sage advice of don’t judge a book by its cover stands true.

BUSTED Uh Oh –both volumes include Trollope Christmas stories –despite my claims from this post.  However, we shall speak no further on this subject.