Nonfiction November

Sophisticated Dorkiness,  I'm Lost in Books, Regular Rumination, and Doing Dewey are hosting Nonfiction November.  

During November,  the co-hosts will be reading and writing about nonfiction, and encouraging other readers to join in through a series of post topics and a couple of readalongs.

The task for this first week is to consider Your Year in Nonfiction: Take a look back at your year of nonfiction and reflect on some questions:

What was your favorite nonfiction read of the year? 
Twelve of my 58 books so far in 2014 (that's 21%) were non-fiction. I was actually surprised to see so many as I don't feel I read enough nonfiction, but I guess it's relative as I love fiction too!

So, my favorite?  I guess I would have to go with One Summer: America, 1927 by Bill Bryson.  I enjoy Bryson's style, I love reading about history, and this time period is absolutely fascinating with lots of larger than life people doing interesting things and the society struggling to catch up with technology, which is changing age-old conventions at breakneck speed.

What nonfiction book have you recommended the most? 

It has to be Orange is the New Black, by Piper Kerman.  I've recommended this to fellow bloggers, family and friends.  So many people have been watching the TV series, and I found it really interesting to compare the book with the series.  Not only in terms of what works best in each media, but how a memoir can become fictionalized.

What is one topic or type of nonfiction you haven’t read enough of yet? 

I set out in 2014 intending to finally read up on WWI, since we're marking the 100-year anniversary of the start of the war.  I have a number of books on my shelf in this area, but haven't read any yet!  Must do in 2015.

What are you hoping to get out of participating in Nonfiction November?

I see this as a great opportunity to find new nonfiction books for my groaning shelves and meet some new book bloggers.   It's also a good way to start thinking about my reading plans for 2015--what I want to accomplish as a reader, and what areas/topics I want to learn more about.

Two Memoirs: 127 Hours and Orange is the New Black

I just got back from a wonderful 2-week road trip during which we listened to several audio books, two of which were memoirs and so begged to be reviewed together.

Since our first stop was Arches in Moab, UT, we started the trip by listening to Aron Ralston read an abridged copy of his book 127 Hours: Between a Rock and a Hard Place.

This is a tough book to rate because on the one hand it is a compelling story about survival.  Aron is the young man who cut off his arm in a canyon in UT where he was biking/hiking/canyoning alone.  A boulder that he dislodged fell on top of him, trapping his arm.  Five days later, after eating his scant rations, making his small amount of water last as long as he could, drinking his own urine, taking photos and videos of himself for his memorial service, he finally broke his arm and sawed off the flesh and tendons, hiked out, and flagged down a helicopter, whose pilot flew him to a hospital.

It was a compelling story.

But, Ralston is such a supremely unlikable, arrogant, braggart that I really had trouble giving the book more than 3 stars.  He talked a lot about how sorry he was that he was causing his parents so much grief (as he anticipated their finding his remains and having to bury him and live with their loss), but in the end declared that he wouldn't have done anything differently. The experience, in his assessment, was worth it.  The cynical side of me has to wonder if the resulting book and movie deal were factors in his final assessment.

He lost his arm, he survived a terrifying and almost fatal ordeal--he also caused Search & Rescue teams to risk their lives to search for him.  He may have thought that his mistake cost him alone, but that is never the case.

The second memoir we listened to was Piper Kerman's Orange is the New Black: My Year in a Women's Prison. This book was unabridged and read by Cassandra Campbell, who is now one of my favorite readers.  I couldn't believe the range of accents and emotions that she was able to capture and convey.  I'm not sure that reading the book would have had the same impact as listening to it had.

Okay, back up. I loved this book.  So interesting and such a contrast in tone to 127 Hours.  Like Aron Ralston, Piper Kerman's memoir is about consequences.  While Kerman also ended up with a book and, in her case TV series, contract, she did regret her illegal activities that led to her incarceration.  She did fervently repent of the pain, heartache, humiliation, and distress she caused her family and friends.  While she concludes that prison changed her, and for the better, I never got the sense that she wouldn't have changed her past actions if she could have.

I've watched Season 1 of the TV show, and as everyone has noted, it is radically stepped up in drama from the book.  Compelling as I found the TV show, I liked the book better.  Often while watching the TV show, I doubted some of the authenticity of many scenes--where were the video cameras that should have caught or prevented a lot of the shenanigans that fueled the plot lines?  Geez, every department store in the country, every mall, every major corporation, every bank, every school is full of video cameras and there aren't any in a women's prison?

Anyway, the book was interesting--I, as a middle-class white woman, could relate to Piper and empathize with her and I found her story sobering and encouraging.  Even awful conditions provide opportunities to grow and expand one's consciousness.  Piper learned that being a contributing member of a society beats being a lone wolf, and that is a valuable life lesson.