Reading My Father

Reading My Father (2011) by Alexandra Styron. Alexandra Styron is the daughter of William Styron, famous author of a number of books, including The Confessions of Nat Turner and Sophie's Choice. Ms. Styron's book is about what it's like to be the daughter of a famous writer, and the fact that -- from her point of view -- her father was really not a very nice man. It's a pretty well written memoir, and if nothing else her constant name-dropping of famous people her father knew keeps it interesting. Really, it's a fine book, but I didn't feel that it illuminated much about William Styron, other than that he was a tyrannical father. A daughter, obviously, has a narrow viewpoint from which to observe her father. She can't possibly see him objectively, and this is both a strength and a weakness of this book. Grade: B

The Year We Left Home

The Year We Left Home (2011) by Jean Thompson. This is one of those books that is just fun to read. Thompson tells the story of the Erickson family of Grenada, Iowa. One generation removed from the farm, the Ericksons are a fairly typical American nuclear family. With two parents and four children, the clan is large enough to supply plenty of interesting characters to be presented in Thompson's wry and insightful style. She switches points of view throughout the novel in a style that is reminiscent of Johathan Franzen's sprawling novels, and that's a good thing. We follow the family's travails from January of 1973 through June of 2003, and often one character's story is used to tangentially to fill out the story of another character. All in all, a masterful novel. The only quibble I have is with the ending. I didn't want it to end. Grade: A-

Borrowed Finery

Borrowed Finery (2001) by Paula Fox. From her youngest years, Paula Fox was passed around to strangers and members of her sprawling, strange family, because her parents couldn't, or wouldn't, take care of her. Through it all, Paula sought love where she could find it, most notably with the fatherly Uncle Elwood, a minister who took care of her for most of her early years. Her clothes were almost all hand-me-downs, giving rise, I suspect, to the title of this book. Borrowed Finery is somewhat episodic, and there seem to be some details left out, but what remains is an excellent read, a life story told with feeling and insight. Grade: B+

Blood, Bones & Butter

Blood, Bones & Butter: The Inadvertent Education of a Reluctant Chef (2011) by Gabrielle Hamilton. Before Gabrielle Hamilton opened her acclaimed New York restaurant Prune, she spent twenty years struggling through jobs in other peoples' restaurants, learning how to cook and eventually, how to be a chef. In this book, she doesn't stint on describing her experiences, but also delves into her own surprising private life. Her first relationship was a lesbian one, but she later went on to get married to a man and had two children. The man she married was Italian, and the couple journeyed to Italy for a month every year to visit his old-world family and his mother, who Gabrielle became fiercely attached to. This is a great book for foodies, and also just a wonderful telling of an extraordinary life. Grade: A

So Much Pretty

So Much Pretty (2011) by Cara Hoffman. In a small town in upstate New York, a small "hippie" family comes to settle down and get back to the land. The Pipers -- Gene, Claire and daughter Alice -- are unconventional, and never are accepted as full-fledged citizens of the town. But their presence becomes a catalyst to events that will rock the town to its core. Meanwhile, newspaper reporter Stacy Flynn comes to the same town, intent on covering rust-belt politics and the effects of agribusiness on the environment. Author Hoffman, who has a history much like Flynn, clearly has an ax to grind, but she grinds it so well that I didn't mind. The only objection I had to her writing was that the book seems to me to needlessly jump around in time, to an extent that is unnecessary to the plot or the characters. Still, I would recommend this book. I can't explain the title. Grade: B+

Started Early, Took My Dog

Started Early, Took My Dog (2011) by Kate Atkinson. This is one of the most pleasurable reads I've encountered lately, endlessly amusing, with layer upon layer of meaning folded into the narrative. The story has a theme: People adopting other people's children, or in one case, a dog. The main protagonist is Atkinson's favorite, former cop Jackson Brodie, who now works as a private investigator. It is Brodie who adopts the dog, a small terrier that is being abused by its master. Adopt may be too kind a word, as Brodie punches the master in the stomach and takes the dog away from him. Also prominent in the book is Tracy Waterhouse, a former policewoman who "adopts" a little girl by paying her mother $3,000 -- or maybe it's 3,000 pounds. The novel takes place in England. Each character has an internal dialogue, which includes side trips down memory lane and little asides that are occasionally extremely funny. I loved reading this book. Grade: A

The Old Romantic

The Old Romantic (2011) by Louise Dean. After 15 years of separation, Nick finally renews contact with his father, Ken. Ken is divorced from Nick's mother, June; Dave, Nick's brother, has been forced to act as the go-between all these years. The relationships among the members of the extended family are complicated, but Dean manages to keep them straight. Her greatest feat is the dialogue, which is pitch-perfect throughout the book. It's a joy to read. Grade: A

The Tiger's Wife

The Tiger's Wife (2011) by Tea Obreht. In a Balkan country healing from years of conflict (one assumes it is the former Yugoslavia), Natalia, a young doctor, arrives at an orphanage on a mission of mercy. But the narrative flashes back and forth between the past and the present, with seemingly endless digressions into the life of Natalia's grandfather, who has recently died. At times fascinating, this book is well written but just didn't hang together for me. It was interesting enough to keep me reading, but when I would come back to it from day to day, I had trouble remembering which strand of the story I was in, and how it related to the other strands. This may have been as much my fault as the author's, but I've read a lot of books and this isn't a common problem. Grade: B