A Girl Named Zippy

A Girl Named Zippy (2001) by Haven Kimmel. After reading Kimmel's "She Got Up Off the Couch," I had to go back and read "A Girl Named Zippy" again to see if it was as good as I remembered. It was better. The subtitle of this book is "Growing Up Small in Mooreland, Indiana." Never heard of Mooreland? Me neither. It's a town of approximately 300 souls where little Zippy Jarvis grew up, and I doubt there's really much special about Mooreland, except that its the home town of Haven Kimmel (her grown-up, married name). Kimmel perfectly captures the voice of a young, rebellious and scandalously poor young girl of about 10 years old, who worships her father, is scared to death of the old woman who lives across the street, and has many young friends in spite of her lack of personal hygiene. Zippy has an astonishing number of adventures for someone from such a small town, but they all sound real and utterly convincing. Grade: A

You Are Not a Gadget

You Are Not a Gadget (2010) by Jaron Lanier. The author's self-described "manifesto" eloquently makes the case that computers are just extensions of humans -- not the other way around. He pushes back, hard, against the idea that computers are getting so smart that soon humans will be irrelevant. He poo-poos a wide range of ideas, such as the notion that sites like Wikipedia, Facebook and Twitter are elevating the "wisdom of mobs" and computer algorithms over the intelligence and judgment of individuals. Unfortunately, Lanier is so erudite and esoteric that his book was hard for me to fully understand. It's not an easy read, but it is an interesting one. Grade: B+

The Postmistress

The Postmistress (2010) by Sarah Blake. The year is 1940, and the U.S. is just on the verge of entering World War II. The novel shows us three separate stories, which will eventually converge: The first two are people living in the tiny town of Franklin, Mass. One is the wife of a doctor who has gone over to London to offer his aid during the Blitz, one is the postmistress of the town, and the third story is that of a female foreign correspondent covering the German bombing in London. The book eloquently shows the contrast between the sleeping America and the suffering England in the year before the U.S. entered the war. It also brightly delineates the plight of the Jews, which most Americans refused to see. It's a lovely book which I would recommend to any reader willing to devote the time to reading a novel. Grade: B+

The Lovely Bones

The Lovely Bones (2002) by Alice Sebold. This book grabs you by the heartstrings at the very beginning and never lets go. We learn in the first paragraph that Susie Salmon, age 14, was murdered on Dec. 6, 1973. But the story is told in the first person, from Susie's point of view. After she is killed, she goes straight to heaven, and becomes a kind of omniscient narrator -- living in her heaven, where some of her fondest wishes come true, but still looking down with longing on earth, where her family and friends are coping as best they can with her disappearance. It's not only a uniquely original idea for a book, it's a beautifully written story that weaves together the many lives which are touched by one 14-year-old girl. By the way, I've seen the movie that they made from the book, and they really didn't capture the essence of the book in the film. There are compromises, inevitably, in converting a book to a movie, but in this case the filmmakers just about totally missed the boat. The book gets a Grade: A

Wifey

Wifey (1978) by Judy Blume. This book tells the story of Sandy Pressman, good girl, hypochondriac and repressed wife. She is 32 years old, and for reasons that become clear in the book, she is beginning to rebel against her overbearing husband. Blume, famed writer of children's books, has here produced a thoroughly adult, moderately explicit story about one woman's efforts to escape the confines of an unhappy marriage. In Sandy's case, this takes mainly the form of a short series of affairs with the husbands of others, some of whom she isn't even attracted to. It's a humorous, involving read, but doesn't delve too deeply into the meaning of the human condition. Grade: B

Ordinary People

Ordinary People (1976) by Judith Guest. It's just about impossible to read this novel without envisioning Timothy Hutton, Donald Sutherland and Mary Tyler Moore in the principle roles. This is no fault of the book, but of the fact that I've seen the motion picture based on the book several times, and it is one of my favorite movies. There are some disappointments for fans of the movie; certain scenes that highlight the film do not appear in the book. Nevertheless, this is a finely crafted, movingly written book that I highly recommend. Grade: A

Nine Stories

Nine Stories (1948-1953) by J.D. Salinger. Most of the stories in this collection are a pleasure to read, and some are a delight. Salinger frequently inserts fantastical stories-within-the-stories, and is always dryly humorous. My favorite is "For Esme -- with Love and Squalor." I first read it in a college literature class, and every time I reread it, it holds some new revelation for me. Some of the stories will seem a bit dated to the modern reader -- there are far too many relationships between adult men and young children to be acceptable in fiction today, for example. But for most of them, the original wit and style remain. It is not hard to recognize the voice of "The Catcher in the Rye" among these stories. Grade: A-

Treasure Hunt

Treasure Hunt (2010) by John Lescroart. Set in San Francisco, "Treasure Hunt" is a pretty standard murder mystery. A man is killed, there are a number of possible suspects, a private eye works with the police to try to bring the culprit to justice -- and to exonerate a pretty suspect who he's just sure didn't do it. It's all made interesting by the detailed and (I presume) accurate San Francisco settings, locales and street addresses. It's not heavy philosophy, but it is a fun read. Grade: B+

Julie & Julia

Julie & Julia (2005) by Julie Powell. Subtitled "My Year of Cooking Dangerously," this volume provides a variety of contrasts. First, there is the contrast between Julie Powell, who wrote the book, and Julia Child, who provided the inspiration for it. Next, there is the contrast between Julie Powell, creative and talented chef, and Julie Powell, crass and foul-mouthed woman. Although I am in awe of Powell's achievement of cooking her way through Child's "Mastering the Art of French Cooking" in one year, I find that Powell the person is a bit of a pill. Not liking the author diminishes the pleasure one gets from reading a first-person book (this one is derived from a blog). Grade: B

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks (2010) by Rebecca Skloot. In this remarkable book, Skloot traces the story of Henrietta Lacks and her family -- who are notable for the fact that the HeLa line of cells, used by laboratories all over the world, came from Henrietta in 1951. Her cells were taken from her without her consent, and proved unusually prolific. In fact, the line of cells taken from Henrietta Lacks has continued to divide and multiply, and has never died out. This makes it extremely valuable for research. Amazingly, the Lacks family -- Henrietta's survivors -- were never informed that her cells were taken, nor were they told how valuable the are. In this book we get both stories -- the scientific story of the HeLa cell line, and what it has been used for, and the emotional story of the Lacks family and what they have gone through on account of being misinformed about Henrietta's involuntary contribution to science. It's not always an easy read, but it is a rewarding one, and Skloot deserves high praise for her decade-long effort to research and write the book. Grade: A-

Tricky Business

Tricky Business (2002) by Dave Barry. Humorist Barry brings his rapier wit to bear on the story of some crooks and the big heist they plan. No kidding, this book made me laugh out loud in spots, something few books manage to do. There's a large cast of characters involved, and the whole drama takes place in south Florida and out at sea off the Florida coast. Barry gives us background stories on almost everyone involved, including a cocktail waitress; the captain of the gambling ship where the action is centered; the band that plays on the ship; the owner of the ship, who finds himself muscled out of the action by organized crime; and the band of crooks, who are disparate and often work at cross-purposes to one another. Oh, and let's not forget Arnie and Phil, residents of the "Old Farts Senile Dying Center," who sneak out of the nursing home on that fateful night to go on the gambling cruise. And Barry has a lot of fun with the Channel 9 news team, who go collectively insane when a tropical storm threatens Miami, and end up losing nine of their reporters and cameramen, killed in the coverage of the impending storm. This book was just a lot of fun to read. It's not heavyweight philosophy, but it entertains raucously. Grade: A

Half Broke Horses

Half Broke Horses (2009) by Jeanette Walls. Walls, author of "The Glass Castle," here delves deeper into the past, telling the story of her own grandmother, Lily Casey Smith. She calls it a true-life novel, since it is basically culled from true events, although she has had to fictionalize certain parts of the story due to gaps in knowledge or the need to protect someone's privacy. This is a slender volume, with a lot of short chapters, which made it compulsively readable to me. It was fascinating to discover this slice of the origins of Jeanette Walls, like filling in part of the background of a painting of which you could previously see only the foreground clearly. Lily Casey Smith was truly a frontier woman, living as she did in the Southwest U.S. from the early years of the 20th century through and beyond World War II. Her life is in many ways a quintessentially American life, and through it we can see a little of ourselves refracted. I would recommend this book to anyone, but for the fullest enjoyment, read "The Glass Castle" first. Grade: A

The Miracle Life of Edgar Mint

The Miracle Life of Edgar Mint (2001) by Brady Udall. "If I could tell you only one thing about my life it would be this: when I was seven years old the mailman ran over my head." Thus begins the story of Edgar Mint, a half-Apache boy whose parents desert him, and who must form his own family out of the people he meets in the world. Edgar spends a long while in a coma after the accident, before miraculously recovering. He finds his time in the hospital to be just lovely -- being taken care of and regarded by everyone as the Miracle Boy. But too soon he has to leave and is sent to a state school -- more like a prison -- for boys. His time there is hellish, but he eventually escapes when he is taken in by a Mormon family. Edgar's adventures continue, some good, mostly bad, and we take the journey with him, until at last he finds the peace and the purpose he has been longing for. An unusual and enjoyable book. Grade: B+

She Got Up Off the Couch

She Got Up Off the Couch (2006) by Haven Kimmel. From the author of "A Girl Named Zippy" comes this continuation of the story of little Zippy Jarvis of Mooreland, Indiana. It is also the story of Zippy's mother, Delonda, who -- after 25 years of marriage -- gets up off the couch and goes back to school, eventually ending up with a master's degree. Kimmel's writing is superb, capturing perfectly the voice of her younger self, the rather eccentric (and hilarious) Zippy. Though she comes from extreme poverty, she seems to have ended up as a happy and well adjusted adult, with posh writing skills. This book was such an enjoyable read that I felt great regret at finishing it so fast. I just loved it. Grade: A