School Book: The Reluctant Fundamentalist

This is it: the last book on this term's class reading lists. And I have to say, it was an excellent read, perfect for the last book of the term. I don't know what exactly I was expecting but Mohsin Hamid's The Reluctant Fundamentalist definitely exceeded all of my expectations. And I'm not 100% sure why.

A big part of the appeal was how it was written. The main character, Changez, narrates the entire book. He is telling an American visitor to Pakistan his history, how he came to America for school, how he loved a woman named Erica, and the circumstances that brought him back to Pakistan. But it is an unusual first person narration. Changez doesn't give you the words of the American, but instead replies to what the man tells him. It makes for a really interesting read.

Another appealing part of the book was Changez himself. The more I read, the more I genuinely liked him. He has a sophisticated way with words that was extremely unique, but also put you at ease; he is a likeable guy. And while his is a narrative that you do not see very often in North America (it tended to be a bit anti-American near the end, but this was completely understandable within the narrative), Changez was always a regular guy who was easy to relate to.

I also agree with Philip Pullman's endorsement on the front cover: "Beautifully written . . . more exciting than any thriller I've read for a long time." The Reluctant Fundamentalist was beautifully written. And it really was a page turner, even if it wasn't really like your typical thriller. The more I read, the more I wanted to keep reading.

All in all, The Reluctant Fundamentalist was an excellent book. I definitely recommend it, no matter your reading preference.

School Book: Captain America: The New Deal

It isn't every day that I get to call something like this a school book. But Captain America: The New Deal is indeed on the reading list for my Literature After 9/11 class! And I was really lucky to find a copy locally - it's been out of print for awhile and will be reprinted in December of this year.

I don't know a whole lot about Captain America. To be perfectly honest, I think most of what I know (and my opinion of him) was formed while playing Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 with a friend on Xbox 360. When all was said and done in that game, he seemed like a real jerk and I didn't really like him. And while my opinion hasn't really changed, it didn't stop me from enjoying this book.

Captain America: The New Deal has such a ridiculous concept: Captain America takes on terrorists! I kept telling everyone before I read it that I don't think the terrorists have much of a chance (unless there's some kind of super villain behind them). I don't want to give any spoilers here, so I won't discuss one way or the other what happened. But the basic plot is that several months after 9/11, a small town in the middle of the US is held hostage by terrorists. It's up to Captain America to save the day, defusing the bombs and rescuing the entire town. The story itself is very exciting, although there were a few confusing pages. Nick Fury appears, which is always a plus. And there was a really great sequence right near the beginning with Captain America searching for survivors at the Twin Towers' Ground Zero.

Like I said, it's a bit on the ridiculous side, but all in all Captain America: The New Deal was a really good read.

School Book: Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close

When I first started reading Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, it reminded me of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time by Mark Haddon. The main characters in both books are rather similar: they are young boys who are both socially awkward. But from the first chapter, I knew that I would enjoy Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close a lot more than The Curious Incident. It was funnier, and overall a better story.

Extremely Loud is the story of Oskar Schell. His father is killed in the Twin Towers. While snooping in his dad's room afterwards, Oskar discovers a strange key hidden in a vase. He decides to embark on a quest to discover what the key opens, even if he has to open every lock in New York City!

At the same time, this is also the story of his family. His grandfather left his grandmother when she told him she was pregnant. Interspersed throughout Oskar's story are chapters written from both of his grandparents' perspectives trying to explain why things happened the way they did. These narratives were just as interesting as the main story.

While Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close was rather different from what I normally like to read, I really enjoyed it. If you're looking for something different, then I recommend giving it a try!

School Book: Falling Man

Don DeLillo's Falling Man is like nothing I've ever read before. I really enjoyed reading it, but I couldn't tell you why. It was an odd book in many ways. The descriptions were fantastic, but everything else was just really strange. It was often hard to tell what character was being talked about, or even talking; they were rarely mentioned by name. Even other characters wouldn't call each other by name (for example, the main characters, Keith and Lianne, called their son "the kid," which was odd, but at least you consistently knew who they were talking about). On top of that, the dialogue was extremely artificial, and very hard to follow.

The actual story is also a bit strange. Falling Man is the story of Keith, who survived the attack on the towers. After getting out just before they collapsed, he decided to head home to his estranged wife. Falling Man is the story of his family coming back together and then slowly coming apart again as time and distance from the towers increases.

Falling Man is not something I would normally read. It's also something I wouldn't normally like. With weird and generally crappy dialogue, I'm surprised I made it through it so quickly. But I honestly did enjoy reading it.

School Book: In the Shadow of No Towers

I was pretty busy today so I decided to read Art Spiegelman's In the Shadow of No Towers. It's a board book/graphic novel, so I knew I could finish it in one night.

In the Shadow of No Towers was a pretty cool read. The first half of the book is made up of the actual comic strip. It deals with the author/illustrator's feelings in the wake of September 11th. The first few panels seemed a bit confusing, but once I got past that I enjoyed reading them.

The second half of the book was really cool though. It has several comic strips from New York at the beginning of the 20th Century reproduced. It was really interesting to learn about them. But more than that, Spiegelman based some of his panels from his strip from these; so while I was reading them, I was repeatedly struck with "aha" moments, realizing where he got the inspiration for some things from.

In the Shadow of No Towers is a quick read that I really enjoyed. Being so far removed from the actual events, it was informative to see how someone who witnessed the towers tumbling felt both during and after 9/11. I can't wait to talk about it in class this term!

School Book: A Gate at the Stairs

While I was reading A Widow's Walk, Lorrie Moore's A Gate at the Stairs came in from Chapters. It sounded interesting, so I decided to read it as soon as I finished A Widow's Walk.

I sort of regret that decision, but on the plus side at least I have finished the book. I had a really hard time getting into it at first because the narrator, the main character Tassie, rambles all over the place and it never seemed to get to a point. But eventually, a few chapters in, A Gate at the Stairs seemed to pick up. Accompanying her employers, Sarah and Edward, Tassie goes to another city and helps them adopt a biracial little girl, Mary-Emma (or Emmie as Sarah calls her). Tassie is employed as a babysitter for the little girl. And between Tassie, Sarah, and Emmie, the book gets to be rather entertaining between pages 100 and 200 or so, during which time Tassie meets a boy and falls in love, all the while entertaining both Emmie and the other children from Sarah's Wednesday multi-racial support group meetings.

But then the book seems to just keep on rambling with no real point (spoilers in this paragraph!). Sarah tells Tassie a bizarre and terrible story about her past, after which Emmie is recalled by the adoption agency (Sarah and Edward failed to disclose this story to the adoption agency, which has resulted in Emmie being taken away). The book felt like it should have ended here, but instead it rambled on for another 60 pages. Yes, there was another significant event that happened in these sixty pages, but the book just seemed to have no real steam left. Those last sixty pages were a torment to read.

This book is, like A Widow's Walk, for my Literature after 9/11 class. Bizarrely, for the first while I couldn't figure out how it really connected to 9/11. Other than a few references to the events and Tassie being afraid of her first plane ride (which she took with Sarah), there was no explicit connection to 9/11. But once Emmie entered the picture, so did racism. While racism isn't a new phenomenon, it's changed its face after 9/11. Tassie's boyfriend, who claims to be Brazilian, tells her that he kept getting stopped while he was living in New York because of his skin colour. Other than that, Emmie and Tassie are subject to more quiet and insidious forms of racism, like the looks Tassie gets when people assume she is the mother of a biracial child.

Other than that, the end of the book deals more directly with the wars that resulted after 9/11. Tassie's brother decides to join the army and is sent to war directly after finishing basic training. This happens pretty much within the last sixty pages, with the reader never quite sure of where he has gone (he sends a postcard home in which he says he's "shipping out tomorrow," (285), but it doesn't say where). While this ends up an important part of the end of the book, it seems like a footnote. I think that is because we are seeing the world the way Tassie sees it, but it seemed to take away from some of the later events (some of which I have to say were creepy. I won't go into detail).

Really, I thought that most of the book was rambly and I just had a really hard time with it. I never really connected with Tassie, and so I just never really cared about the book.

School Book: A Widow's Walk

It's almost that time of year again and I wanted to read a bit ahead before classes start in a few weeks. I'm taking two classes this semester: America After 9/11 and Translating the Middle Ages. Because I am already a book ahead in the Middle Ages class (I've already read the translation of Beowulf we're using), I decided to start with a book from the 9/11 class. I chose A Widow's Walk by Marian Fontana because it was written by a writer, so I was sure it would be good.

Well, the book was really good. I just wasn't prepared for how depressing it would be (I know, something called A Widow's Walk kind of screams depressing). A Widow's Walk is Marian's memoir of her life in the year after 9/11. Her husband, Dave, was a firefighter who died trying to rescue people from the Towers. The morning of 9/11, Marian and Dave were preparing to celebrate their 8th wedding anniversary. They had just talked to one another, preparing to meet up at a coffee shop. But while Marian was dropping their son, Aidan off at school, Dave was called to the Towers and to his death.

A Widow's Walk tells the story of what happened in that first year after 9/11. It tells of the terrible grief experienced by Marian, her family, and the wives of the other firefighters from Squad 1 who lost their lives that day. It tells of 5 year old Aidan, refusing to believe that his father is never coming back. It is a story of terrible loss, but also the beauty of the human spirit as friends, family, the country and the world band together to help the families of that day.

Part way through, Marian also starts the 9/11 Widows and Victims' Families Association. While the wives of the firefighters are taken care of due to the dangerous nature of their job, other families do not have the same supports present. Marian bands together with other charities started in the wake of 9/11 to help those in need. Marian also fights for the firefighters themselves, first to keep Squad 1 open when the city wants to close it down in the first few weeks after 9/11, and later lobbying for higher wages for the firefighters.

My only complaint is that there are a million different characters and it's really hard to keep everyone straight. Other than that, A Widow's Walk is a beautiful book, with some excellent descriptions and phrases. It is also incredibly sad, documenting one woman's terrible grief. It was an excellent read which really brought the whole tragedy of 9/11 back to me nine years after the fact.