Reviews

Regeneration – Pat Barker

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BOOK #170
Reviewer: Beth’s List Love (review previously published February 5, 2014)

RegenerationThe books in this trilogy have received awards and huge critical acclaim, but I was having trouble getting excited about starting them.

Once again I have learned that I irrationally fear historical fiction, but love it once I begin to read. This book was particularly interesting to me as a psychologist and faculty member teaching psychology. I am far from psychoanalytic in orientation, but this novel does a marvelous job of illustrating how some of the techniques of psychoanalysis can be tremendously useful in understanding psychological phenomena.

The novel also beautifully illustrates the many potential psychiatric manifestations of war trauma. It is written with tremendous compassion for the men whose lives it portrays, soldiers suffering shell shock in the first world war and the doctors treating them. This was a very moving account of the impact of combat in WWI on both the men at the front and those who treated them after the psychologically traumatic events they lived through. It’s based on real people and real events.

It is beautifully written, combining some of the real poetry written by soldiers in their time convalescing in a military psychiatric hospital with the author’s own equally well-crafted prose. This novel, which is the first of the trilogy, explores questions about the morality of war, about the ways in which the military and political aims of those safe and in power are played out at great cost by those who actually do the fighting, about the morality of returning psychologically traumatized individuals to relative mental health only to send them back into the trauma.

It juxtaposes two very different ways of treating conversion symptoms which translate conflicts about returning to combat into debilitating physical symptoms, and provides excellent examples of psychodynamic psychotherapy complete with analysis of dreams. I used it to teach my personality theories course the day I started reading it, because it was so perfect for illustrating some of what I was teaching about.

I am really looking forward to the rest of the series! 5 out of 5 stars.

Lolita – Vladimir Nabokov

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BOOK #496
Reviewer: Tall, Short, Tiny & a Pickle

LolitaLolita is one of those books that I’d heard of, but knew very little about before picking it up from our local library. It is considered one of the best novels of the 20th-Century, and therefore I had high expectations….which sadly, weren’t met.

Lolita tells the story of Humbert Humbert, a 38-year-old scholar with an obsession for young girls (“nymphets”), who, after a failed marriage and a stint in a mental hospital, falls for his landlady’s 12-year-old daughter. He is infatuated with young Dolores (who he nicknames Lolita), partly because she reminds him of his childhood sweetheart who died prematurely.

“I knew I had fallen in love with Lolita forever; but I also knew she would not be forever Lolita.”

Humbert takes every opportunity to be alone with his Lolita, and when they aren’t alone, he finds ways to watch her inconspicuously, or touch her in a seemingly paternal way. While she is away on summer camp, her mother, Charlotte, gives Humbert an ultimatum: marry her, or move out. Humbert doesn’t want to be away from Lolita, and agrees to marry Charlotte; she has no idea of his feelings for Lolita until she reads his diary. She threatens to expose Humbert, but before she can take any action, she is struck by a car and dies.

Charlotte’s death gives Humbert the opportunity to become more than just a step-father to Lolita; they begin a sexual relationship and spend a couple of years on the road, until settling in a town where Lolita can attend a girls’ school (Humbert is possessive and jealous, refusing to allow her anything to do with boys of her own age). While at the school, Lolita becomes involved in drama, and her quest for freedom from Humbert begins here.

The subject matter of Lolita is uncomfortable at times, but it is less so than I thought it might be. The novel is written in such a way that the language and humour took a prominent position for me – this might not be the case for everyone, however, and if you do plan on reading this book, please go into it knowing it has been classified by some as “erotic fiction”. Nabokov’s style is typical of other Russian authors, but unusually, his novel is set in America, not Russia.

I think that the main reason, however, that I didn’t find Lolita as uncomfortable as I expected is that the underlying theme of love, regardless of societal norms:

“Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. Lo-lee-ta: the tip of the tongue taking a trip of three steps down the palate to tap, at three, on the teeth. Lo. Lee. Ta. She was Lo, plain Lo, in the morning, standing four feet ten in one sock. She was Lola in slacks. She was Dolly at school. She was Dolores on the dotted line. But in my arms she was always Lolita. Did she have a precursor? She did, indeed she did. In point of fact, there might have been no Lolita at all had I not loved, one summer, an initial girl-child. In a princedom by the sea. Oh when? About as many years before Lolita was born as my age was that summer. You can always count on a murderer for a fancy prose style. Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, exhibit number one is what the seraphs, the misinformed, simple, noble-winged seraphs, envied. Look at this tangle of thorns.”

There was just something about Lolita that missed the mark for me. It was poetic, and beautifully-written, but it didn’t grab me, and I found reading it a bit of a chore. This novel wasn’t for me, but I accept that others have and will love it, in order for it to take its place on the 1001 Books list.

Trainspotting – Irvine Welsh

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BOOK #134
Reviewer: Tall, Short, Tiny & a Pickle

TrainspottingIt has been a number of years since I read Trainspotting, but both the novel and the movie have stuck with me with unsurprising clarity. If you have read the book, you will know exactly what I am talking about: it is memorable in both content and style, and while I don’t know that it’s  book you necessarily enjoy, it is one you will urge others to read, if only to have someone to discuss it with.

Trainspotting is written as a series of short stories, collated to become an oft-incoherent but certainly cohesive novel. The stories revolve around a group of young adults living in Edinburgh, who all are heroin users, friends of heroin users, or engage in other self-destructive, addictive behaviours.

There’s Mark Renton, the depressed, intelligent main character who sometimes appears “normal” and at other times is stealing to support his drug habit. His tales are darkly-funny, full of crazy anecdotes and abhorrence of many of his friends. One of Mark’s oldest friend is Sick Boy, who indulges in frequent sex with random women for whom he feels nothing but contempt. He thinks very highly of himself, even when binging on heroin, and appears to have no morals whatsoever. Another childhood friend of Mark’s is Tommy, who doesn’t use heroin but dabbles in speed. When his girlfriend leaves him, however, he begins to experiment with heroin, and his experiments do not end well.

Spud is perhaps the most likeable of all the characters in this novel, despite being sent to prison for theft; he is a sweet character with a kind heart, who unfortunately will never have the skills or opportunity to make anything of himself. In stark contrast to Spud is Franco Begbie, a violent character who constantly bullies his “friends”, despite being quite loyal. He is an alcoholic, and addicted to speed. Davie Mitchell is the complete opposite to all the other characters in the book; he has a university degree and a job, and is seemingly “normal”. However, being part of such a group of friends can not leave someone unscathed, and unfortunately, Davie is no exception.

Each chapter is told from differing perspectives (with Mark’s being the constant voice throughout), and this makes it challenging to read: Welsh has written in the varying “dialects” of Edinburgh, which takes quite some time to get used to. A lack of quotation marks to identify speech also adds to the challenging nature of the story, but I think these quirks merely serve to accentuate the difficulties and horrors faced by the characters.

The subject matter isn’t pleasant, and there are scenes that are uncomfortable and difficult to read, but overall, I think Trainspotting is worthy of its place on this list. It may not be a story you enjoy, but it’s likely to make you think, and it will undoubtedly register on some level.

Beloved – Toni Morrison

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BOOK #223
Reviewer: Tall, Short, Tiny & a Pickle

BelovedBeloved was my first Toni Morrison novel, and golly, what a place to start. This is a powerful story, with memorable characters and a strong sense of history.

Beloved tells the story of Sethe and her 18-year-old daughter Denver, who have escaped from slavery to Ohio – a free state – after the American Civil War.

In order to keep her children safe, Sethe tries to kill Denver and her three siblings, but is is successful in killing only her eldest daughter. Her two sons run away, and Denver is just a baby at the time, but her older sister, age two, is buried with a tombstone with simply “Beloved” on it. When a strange young woman appears on their new front porch, saying nothing about who she is but claiming her name is Beloved, Sethe believes that she is her murdered daughter. She falls over backwards to spoil Beloved, offering her the best of everything, including food, to the detriment of her own health. While Sethe wastes away, Beloved grows larger; she becomes very demanding and throws toddler-like tantrums when she doesn’t get her way.

While Sethe’s actions towards her children seem abhorrent on the surface, one of her redeeming features is her intense devotion to her children; her attempts at murder are to keep her children protected from the horrors she experienced as a slave. I went through stages of loving and hating Sethe for her treatment of Beloved and Denver, and by the end of the story, I still had mixed feelings towards her.

Denver is a shy, intelligent girl, often portrayed as possessing a gift for communicating with ghosts. While Beloved flourishes, Denver appears to withdraw further from the outside world, but by the end of the novel, she is proven to be much stronger, more courageous and determined than I first thought. Denver is the most interesting of characters, for me, and I found her a fascinating character.

“There is a loneliness that can be rocked. Arms crossed, knees drawn up, holding, holding on, this motion, unlike a ship’s, smooths and contains the rocker. It’s an inside kind–wrapped tight like skin. Then there is the loneliness that roams. No rocking can hold it down. It is alive. On its own. A dry and spreading thing that makes the sound of one’s own feet going seem to come from a far-off place.”

The character of Beloved is also intriguing, and throughout the story, Morrison presents three different perspectives regarding who Beloved may be. She may simply be a stranger, a young woman who has been kept locked away as a slave for many years, which would account for her language and social difficulties. Sethe believes her to be her Beloved, her toddler, because of the way she acts, her outward appearance, her breath that smells like milk and her knowledge of a few facts that only one of Sethe’s children could know. In later chapters, Beloved tells stories that make Sethe and the reader wonder if she is Sethe’s mother; she shares personal traits with Sethe’s mother and recounts stories of her voyage to America from Africa.

Beloved is a great story, with a strong sense of the power the past can have over people, and how they can either overcome it, or let it haunt them forever. It is uplifting, horrifying, saddening and hopeful all at once, and I can’t recommend it highly enough.

Cannery Row – John Steinbeck

Ms Oh Waily2 Comments

Book # 565

Reviewer: Ms Oh Waily

CRWhen I read Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men back in 2012 I meant to follow up immediately with this relatively slim novel.  Sadly I moved on and Cannery Row had to wait until now.

Let me start off the review by saying outright – I loved this.  Everything about it.  And my review may be overly glowing as a result.

The novel was first published in 1945 but it is set during the Great Depression.  Specifically it is set in Monterey, California and one particular avenue which is colloquially known as Cannery Row for it’s rows of sardine canneries*. It is the story of the locals on the Row.  Lee Chong is the local grocer and shopkeeper.  Dora Flood is the local Madam and owner of the misnamed Bear Flag Restaurant, where her girls are available to the local population.  Doc is a marine biologist who owns and lives in his workshop at Western Biological, and then there are Mack and ‘the boys’ – squatters in Lee Chong’s warehouse known as the Palace Flophouse and Grill.

The novel is barely a novel in the sense of having a plot.  Really it feels like a meander through the lives of these many and varied characters.  The thread that holds it all together are the ‘boys’ from the flophouse.  Mack, Hazel, Jones and Eddie pop up throughout and provide much of the entertaining reading.  But we are treated to vignettes of life amongst a range of locals, we are invited in to their lives and given an insight into the hard lives of the depression.

You would think that a novel set in the depression with the central characters being a group of bums would be, in itself, depressing.  You would be wrong.  Other than a few poignant sections, the joie de vivre that exudes from the pages belies the harshness of the struggle to put food on the table or a roof of some sort over their heads.   Steinbeck beautifully describes the lives and surroundings of these characters, so much so that you feel you can reach out and touch their them.  Here is how he introduces us to Doc’s laboratory:

Behind the office is a room where in aquaria are many living animals; there are also the microscopes and the slides and the drug cabinets, the cases of laboratory glass, the work benches and little motors, the chemicals.  From this room come smells – formaline, and dry starfish, and sea water and menthol, carbolic acid and acetic acid, smell of brown wrapping-paper and straw and rope, smell of chloroform and ether, smell of ozone from the motos, smell of fine steel and thin lubricant from the microscopes, smell of banana oil and rubber tubing, smell of drying wool socks and boots, sharp pungent smell of rattlesnakes, and musty frightening smell of rats.  And through the back door comes the smell of kelp and barnacles when the tide is out and the smell of salt and spray when the tide is in.

He continues to document Doc’s world in his library and kitchen, and then on to his person:

Doc is rather small, deceptively small, for he is wiry and very strong and when passionate anger comes on him he can be very fierce.  He wears a beard and his face is half Christ and half satyr and his face tells the truth.

And wonderful descriptions of this sort abound in this story about people.  But not to be outdone are the humorous pieces of observation, including this classic towards the end of the story when Mack and the boys (and entire neighbourhood) create a party for Doc:

The nature of parties has been imperfectly studied.  It is, however, generally understood that a party has a pathology, that it is a kind of an individual and that it is likely to be a very perverse individual.  And it is also generally understood that a party hardly ever goes the way it is planned or intended.  This last, of course, excludes those dismal slave parties, whipped and controlled and dominated, given by ogreish professional hostesses.  These are not parties at all, but acts and demonstrations, about as spontaneous as peristalsis and as interesting as its end product.

The humour exudes throughout the novel.  Even when the viewing is grim, there is the buoyancy of the human spirit, softening the edges and making the bizarre seem normal and even uplifting.

My edition is 136 pages long.  It’s not much, but it’s worth the effort.

Happy reading.

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* according to Wikipedia the street that the novel is actually set in was Ocean View Avenue, but was later renamed to Cannery Row in honour of the story.