Round Up and Harvest Time

There are a number of books that I've read but not blogged about recently, so it's time to do another roundup.

 Around the World in 80 Plants, by Jonathan Drori - my sister Frances gave me this gorgeous book for Christmas 2021. I read it slowly, absorbing the details of the 80 plants that the author featured, and enjoying the enchanting illustrations. Beginning in Northern Europe and ending in North America, the plants featured range from the ordinary to the exotic, from the lowly to the stupendous. Most are important to the region they are native, and many are guideposts to the culture of the region. A truly remarkable book and one that I will dip into from time to time since I have done the full armchair travel once. Lucille Clerc is the illustrator--visit her website for a visual treat.

Moby Dick, by Herman Melville - Knowing that another trip to New England was in store for September and that we would be visiting New Bedford, MA and Mystic, CT before heading up to Maine, I decided to reread Moby Dick. I read it roughly 40 years ago and remembered sort of liking it. I'll be doing a travelogue soon on this trip but suffice it to say that Moby Dick begins in New Bedford, the whaling capital of the world in the 1880s and the richest city in North America at one time. It took me all summer and into September but I did reread the entire crazy thing. Parts were riveting. Parts were revolting. Parts made me question Melville's sanity (I not the only one to do so, btw). Parts were boring. I found a lot of the technical details associated with whaling and living on a ship for a multi-year voyage to be fascinating from a historical perspective. The parts that dragged for me was when Melville waxed philosophical and let his mind and pen range without purpose. I did pick up an abridged, illustrated copy of the book at the New Bedford Whaling National Historical Park store. This is a book that requires illustrations because of all the arcane information--thank goodness I had my iphone handy to look up stuff. I can't image rereading the whole thing again, but I will definitely refer to the abridged version "whenever I find myself growing grim about the mouth." 

Oh yeah, I almost forgot. The other reason I decided to reread Moby Dick is because it figures so prominently in John Irving's The Last Chairlift, which I read earlier this year.

Straight Man, by Richard Russo - I've only read Empire Falls by Russo (the novel that won him a Pulitzer Prize), but since he is one of my husband's favorite authors, I took this along to Maine to read after finishing Moby Dick. It was great--a perfect contrast to the Melville tome, laugh out loud funny, but also poignant and chock full of interesting, quirky characters. It takes place in a struggling college in rural Pennsylvania and recounts the internecine warfare that typifies academia, in this case, the English department. Hank, the main character, is currently one of my favorite literary characters. He can barely communicate without being a smart aleck, but he loves his wife and dog and children, probably in that order!

Pride, by Ibi Zoboi - This is a riff on Pride and Prejudice, set in Brooklyn. I read it for my JASNA region's bookclub. I haven't read any Austen-inspired novels in quite a while, and this was very well done. Featuring an upwardly mobile African American family that moves into a traditionally working-class African American neighborhood as the basic premise in which the Lizzy, Darcy, Jane, Bingley, and the rest of the cast can play out the story.

Hope you are all enjoying the changing season. I've been harvesting my garden, making tomato sauce and salsa, blanching and freezing carrots, living on turkey green chili, picking raspberries every morning for my yogurt, and storing onions and shallots for the winter. Tomorrow we harvest our apples--a bumper crop this year, which means I'll be busy making applesauce and apple pie filling over the next few days.