Memphis Reads Archive

Fiction/International

Jesse Pool reviews THE DEATH OF VISHNU by Manil Suri (Norton, 2001)

At the beginning of the novel, we are introduced to Vishnu, an aging drunk who lives on the landing below the Asrani and the Pathak families. He's paid Tall Ganga, the former resident of the landing, for the privilege to live on the stairs and to do menial chores for the families in the building.

Vishnu becomes very ill, but the people in the building go on living their lives around him. Some hope that he is merely feigning illness, while others hope that he has already died. A very few feel empathy for him, although everyone seems to fear infection by coming to near him.

As Vishnu dies, he is separated from his body and ascends the stairs of the building. The novel alternates between Vishnu's vivid memories of his mother and his lover Padmini and stories of the residents of the Bombay building where Vishnu has lived. It's hinted that Vishnu may in fact be the final incarnation of the Hindu god Vishnu.

Through the interconnected stories, readers are exposed to many of the facets that make up modern Indian life. The Asranis and Pathaks, for instance, are bitter rivals as well as neighbors because they are forced to share a kitchen from which each believe the other to be pilfering. There is a forbidden romance between the Asranis' daughter Kavita and Salim Jalal, a Muslim boy upstairs. We see other conflicts between different faiths and traditions as well.

This novel is sometimes comical, and sometimes tragic, but always engaging. It may help to know a little bit about Indian customs and the Hindu religion, but it is not necessary to enjoy this novel.



Jesse Pool, Highland Branch Library

Labels: International Fiction, Reviews by Jesse Pool

Fiction/Mainstream

Jesse Pool reviews COMPANY by Max Barry (Doubleday, 2006)

Company begins with a donut, or rather, with the absence of a donut. It's Jones' first day, and he's waiting patiently to meet the members of the training sales department where he will work while his new coworkers are hashing out who, if anyone, stole Roger's donut before he arrived to the morning meeting. Roger insists that it's not the donut, but the lack of respect that it implies.

Jones soon finds that his first job is not quite what he expects. He comes to a startling realization that he isn't even sure what it is that the company does. To the shock of his coworkers (who can't say that they know what it is that the company does, either), Jones begins a quest to find out just what it is that Zephyr Holdings does.

When Jones finally does find out, the story takes a turn for the weirder, and the book adds a Joseph-Finder-style corporate intrigue to the Scott-Adams-style corporate farce that has been going on from the beginning. The quirky characters and the dynamics between them are reminiscent of television's "The Office" as well.

Jones, unwilling to settle for "that's the way it's always been done" and "keep a low profile," ends up changing the way Zephyr Holdings, and possibly the whole business world, works. And yes, we do find out what happened to the donut.


Jesse Pool, Highland Branch Library

Labels: Mainstream Fiction, Reviews by Jesse Pool

Fiction/Adventure

Jesse Pool reviews ZORRO by Isabelle Allende (Harper Collins, 2005)

Zorro is a name that nearly everyone knows. But how much do you actually know about the swashbuckling hero? Zorro tells the story of how Diego de la Vega’s parents—a Spanish war hero and a Shoshone Indian war chief—meet during an attack on a Spanish mission: Diego’s father defending the mission from attack and Diego’s mother leading the assault. From there, we follow Diego’s life as he grows up, eventually becoming the familiar masked hero known as Zorro.

Raised between two cultures, Diego learns about honor, justice, respect, dignity and courage. His father raises him to be a Spanish gentleman and his Shoshone mother and grandmother secretly teach him and his adopted brother Bernardo Indian virtues as well. By fifteen, Diego has learned to fence and has had a vision quest where he finds his spirit guide—the zorro, which is Spanish for fox. After several adventures in his homeland, Diego and Bernardo set sail for Spain so that Diego may get a quality education. It is in Spain that Diego’s transformation into Zorro begins. He picks up several mentors, joins a secret society dedicated to justice, and encounters his arch nemesis, Rafael Moncada.

By the end of the book, we see Diego transformed from the boy he was in the beginning to the hero many people are familiar with today. Along the way, he’s outwitted or out-fought bullies, soldiers, sailors, pirates, gypsies, gamblers, and others, often picking up their tricks and skills. Also, no swashbuckling story would be complete without a tragic romance or two, and this one does not disappoint.

Labels: Adventure, Reviews by Jesse Pool

Fiction/Fantasy

Jesse Pool reviews AMERICAN GODS by Neil Gaiman (W. Morrow, 2001)

Shadow Moon has had a lot of bad days. He didn't expect the day he got out of prison to be one of them. Shadow fears that the warden has opted not to release him early when he is summoned to the office a few days before his scheduled release. In a one-two punch, the warden tells him that he is free to go, and that his wife died the day before in an automobile accident with his
best-friend and would-be employer.

On his way home to sort out his wife's things, he is diverted en route and meets a mysterious Mr. Wednesday on a flight. Impossibly, Wednesday knows all sorts of things about Shadow and his late wife, Laura, and offers Shadow a job. Shadow refuses, but the persistent Mr. Wednesday convinces him after another encounter on the ground.

As it turns out, Wednesday is what is left of the Norse god Odin, who was carried to the Americas by the belief of ancient Viking explorers. Shadow soon learns that there are many other ancient gods and mythological creatures roaming the Americas, many of them immigrants, although there are a few newer gods, born of science and technology. America is a poor land for gods, however, and there is a war brewing between the old and the new gods over the limited amount of belief. The new gods seem to believe that by stomping out the embers of the old gods that they can grow in power and influence.

Many of the old gods are reluctant to join Wednesday, thinking he's looking more for a glorious last stand than an actual victory. Shadow spends his time helping Wednesday to convince the old gods to stand with him, avoiding the agents of the new gods, and trying to get his life back in order between visits from his dead wife Laura, who just can't seem to leave him alone. Shadow and Wednesday travel the country trying to gather an army before the war begins, often meeting prospective allies in odd tourist traps which are the megaliths of the new world. When the war finally comes (at Rock City on top of Lookout Mountain, no less), the final outcome lies in Shadow's hands.

Author Neil Gaiman does an excellent job of reimagining what many of the ancient gods might be like today, many of them old and decrepit from centuries of neglect and disbelief. Fans of mythology will have fun guessing at the identities of characters as they are introduced and slowly revealed for what they are. European, Egyptian, Asian, African and Russian deities all appear in the novel, as well as others that I couldn't identify. Even more interesting than the way Gaiman brings minor characters to life is his ability to portray the American landscape, from small, frozen New England towns, to the vast plains of the Midwest, through arid Native American reservations, all the way to the glitter of Las Vegas. Some of the places in the book are fictional, while others are very real. The huge cast of characters and the vastness of the American landscape make the novel feel truly epic.


Jesse Pool, Highland Branch Library

Labels: Fantasy, Reviews by Jesse Pool

In mid-December, Terry Pratchett announced that he has a rare form of Alzheimer’s. He's staying optimistic that he will be able to fulfill his public appearances and book obligations for several more years and in typical Pratchett style, reminded his readers that he would like to keep things positive and that he's "not dead."

Pratchett is one of my favorite authors. I was delighted to have the opportunity to meet him last March at Mid-South Con, the local science-fiction and fantasy convention. He does not often get to attend fan gatherings in the United States since he lives in England. He was very friendly and quick to smile, autograph a book, or pose for a picture with fans. At a panel, he mentioned that health issues may restrict his ability to travel in the future, but he was very hopeful to continue writing.

His long-running Discworld series has over 35 titles and counting. The series began as a satirical look at the fantasy genre and over the years has morphed into something much larger. Pratchett uses his saber-sharp wit to poke at a variety of real-world issues and institutions which he satirizes in his books. Some of Pratchett's targets include academia, various works of literature, Hollywood, war, shopping malls, the press, the post office and even the birth of rock music, or rather "music with rocks in."

In addition to ordinary humans, Pratchett's Discworld is populated with dwarves, trolls and many other mythological races which are a staple in the fantasy genre. While many of his stories feature heroes, wizards or witches, many of them are also populated by cowards, beggars, and misfits. Sometimes a character falls into more than one category, such as the wizard Rincewind, who has never successfully cast a spell and whose only strategy when faced with an obstacle is to run away from it as fast and as long as possible.

Some of Pratchett's most memorable characters are the anthropomorphic personifications, which are creatures that exist because everyone knows that they exist, like Death. The Death of the Discworld looks exactly like what most people would expect him to and his voice is so deep that he talks in ALL CAPITAL LETTERS. Like most things Discworld, there is more to Death than appearances. Despite his looks, he shows curiosity and kindness towards all living beings at the point when they cease to be living things. At one point, he explains to his apprentice Mort "THERE IS NO JUSTICE, JUST US."

The setting of the Discworld novels is as important to the books as the characters are. The world is a flat disc, which is supported on the back of four massive elephants that are in turn supported by the shell of Great A'tuin, the world turtle.

Many of the books are set in the city Ankh-Morpork, which is the great metropolis of the Discworld. Ankh-Morpork lies on the river Ankh which is more mud than water, but still fluid enough to call a river. Over the centuries Ankh-Morporkians have built on top of older structures when they could no longer build out, so it's often said that Ankh-Morpork is built on Ankh-Morpork.

Ankh-Morpork is a melting pot of many of the different races of the Discworld and home to the wizards of Unseen University. The city is ruled by the Patrician, Lord Havelock Vetinari, a master politician who has legalized crime simply because it makes it easier to regulate. Thieves, assassins, beggars and ladies-of-negotiable affection all have their own guilds. The city is teeming with unwashed masses and there are numerous bars and opportunities for fools to be separated from their money. As the series progresses, Ankh-Morpork becomes more modern and develops conveniences such as a post office, daily newspaper and even a crude telegraph system composed of semaphore towers.

Most of the books featuring the witches take place in Lancre, which is a small kingdom in the mountains. Other places of interest in Discworld geography include Uberwald (like Eastern Europe with vampires, werewolves, and Igors), the great cabbage fields of Sto Lat, Klatch (similar to Africa), Fourecks (kind of like Australia), and the Counterweight Continent (vaguely Asian).

Although you could read nearly any of the Discworld books as a stand-alone title, many of the characters and places seem to develop over time. There are several sub-series which revolve around different sets of characters. There are the wizards of Unseen University, the witches of Lancre, the Nightwatch of Ankh-Morpork as well as other characters who appear less frequently. Characters from different sequences do occasionally pop up in other stories, however, so readers who read the books sequentially may have a better understanding of some characters.

A lot of Pratchett's appeal comes from his use of satire, humor and puns. His books are almost cartoonish caricatures of many of the subjects of his books. It's rare that I go more than a page or two without having to stop and laugh. Another element of his appeal is his ability to take genre conventions and turn them inside-out and upside-down so that fantasy elements that many readers may already know seem fresh and often produce unexpected twists on familiar stories.

The Discworld books make up the majority of Pratchett's work, and have inspired games, BBC films, companion books, and a host of fan websites. Pratchett has also collaborated with Neil Gaiman on a book titled Good Omens and has written several children's books including the Johnny Maxwell trilogy.

Visit Terry Pratchett's official website:
http://www.terrypratchettbooks.com/

Read Terry's post about diagnosis on Discworld illustrator Paul Kidby's website:
http://www.paulkidby.com/news/index.html

Read the story from CNN:
http://www.cnn.com/2007/SHOWBIZ/books/12/13/terry.pratchett/index.html?iref=newssearch

Labels: Author Spotlight, Fantasy, Reviews by Jesse Pool

Fiction/Mystery, Historical

Jesse Pool reviews SILVER PIGS by Lindsey Davis (Crown Publishers, 1989)

Silver Pigs is the first novel in Marcus Didius Falco mystery series. Generally, I'm not much a of mystery reader, but a customer who shares a passion for some of my favorite authors recommended the series to me, so I thought I'd give this book a try.

This is a hard-boiled detective story with a twist. Falco is a private informer in ancient Rome. He's 30-years old. He rents a one room apartment which doubles as his office on the 6th floor of an apartment building, which is bad for business since anyone who might want to use his services would have to climb six flights of stairs to see if he's in. When he's late with the rent, which is fairly often, he can expect a visit from gladiators who are employed by his landlord as collection men. In addition to the gladiators, he has to be on the look out for his mother, who is constantly tidying up his room and running off any flute girls he may bring home for the evening.

Falco's luck changes one afternoon when a gorgeous young lady of 16 runs into him at the Temple of Jupiter. It goes from "bad" to "worse". The girl is the daughter of a senator and she is being chased by four thugs who had recently kidnapped her.

Her name is Sosia Camillina, and she confides in him that there is a plot to overthrow the emperor Vespasian being paid for with stolen silver smuggled in to Rome from Britain. The silver is in the form of ingots, or "silver pigs" as they are called. It is illegal for anyone other than the government to own one, so when one comes into Falco's possession, he has to be careful about where to hide it until he can be certain of who he can trust in the government in order to turn it in.

Falco is ready to walk away from the case, but when Sosia Camillina is murdered and it looks as if no one will answer for it, he feels compelled to see the case through, even though it means going to Britain. Falco has been to Britain once before, as a young soldier, and hated every damp, cold minute of it. To make matters worse, in order to find out about the scheme, he must endure the wicked tongue of Sosia's beloved cousin Helena Justina as well as work undercover as a slave for several months in the silver mines.

When he has gathered enough evidence of the plot, Falco accompanies Helena Justina back to Rome. The pair must be careful to avoid getting killed by the conspirators they are trying to unmask while they try to discover who murdered Sosia Camillina.

In addition, romantic tension between Falco and Helena Justina has developed over the long trip home from Britain, which troubles Falco because of their difference in social station.

I'm looking forward to reading the rest of this series. Davis paints a vivid picture of ancient Rome and ancient Britain while giving the reader an action-packed mystery full of developed characters, romance, intrigue, and even a chase scene on chariots.

Jesse Pool, Highland Branch Library

Labels: Historical Fiction, Mystery, Reviews by Jesse Pool

Fiction/Gay and Lesbian , Science Fiction

Jesse Pool reviews CHINA MOUNTAIN ZHANG by Maureen McHugh (Tom Doherty Associates, 1992)

Winner of a 1992 Lambda Literary Award, China Mountain Zhang portrays a future where a series of socialist revolutions called the Great Cleansing Winds have swept most of the globe and China has become the only world superpower. McHugh explores this future through the stories of Rafael Zhong Shan Zhang and several other characters whose lives tangentially connect with his.

Born and raised in Brooklyn, Zhang appears to have all the makings of a successful American Born Chinese, or ABC for short. He is young and well-mannered as well as a trained engineering tech. However, Zhang has several secrets he’d like to keep. First of all, he’s not really full-blood Chinese—his mother is Hispanic, but his parents made sure he was genetically altered at birth to receive the full benefit of a Chinese appearance. Even though Zhang looks Chinese, the name his mother gave him is the Chinese equivalent of George Washington Jones, which is why he chooses to go by his last name. An even larger hurdle for Zhang is the fact that he is a homosexual, which is an offense that can lead to social ostracism, hard labor reform or even execution in socialist America and elsewhere.

Zhang’s troubles begin one day at work when his boss—Foreman Qian, who is an exile from China—asks him to come home to meet his daughter as a possible suitor in hopes of getting them both back to China. His boss does not realize that Zhang is gay and not full-blooded Chinese. To make matters worse, Qian's daughter has an unattractive facial deformity which she assumes is the cause of the awkwardness between them. Despite their awkwardness, a friendship develops between them which ends up costing Zhang his job.

From there, we follow Zhang as he spends time working at the North Pole, studying in China, and looking for work in Arizona. These tales are interspersed with narratives by people whose lives intersect with his. Several episodes even take place on a Martian colony, where Zhang tutors an engineering student long distance from Earth.

I found it interesting how McHugh also flavors the text with Chinese, Spanish, futuristic slang (e. g., bent for gay) and science fiction staples such as people plugging directly into machines and the colonization of space. China Mountain Zhang evokes elements of both classic science fiction and the cyberpunk movement of the 1980’s as well as explores the relationships that bond the many different and varied characters. The future world she describes is both believable and vivid.

Jesse Pool, Highland Branch Library

Labels: Gay and Lesbian Fiction, Reviews by Jesse Pool, Science Fiction

I love audiobooks. I find that I can listen to books that I would never finish on my own if I were actually reading them, and by listening to audiobooks I get to "read" a lot more books than I might otherwise have time for.

Last year a coworker introduced me to The Great Courses by The Learning Company. At first, I was a little skeptical of the idea of hours and hours of college lectures. However, I was won over after listening to the first 15 minutes of Famous Romans. I marvelled at the energy, passion and animation that the professor had in relating the various biographical sketches of the famous Romans of the course title. I learned all kinds of interesting things about ancient Rome and the series left me hungry for more. Recently, I finished Plato, Socrates and the Dialogues and have been thinking about pulling out some of those old philosophy 101 text books that have been in the back room undisturbed for the past 10 years or so.

Since my coworker pointed these out to me last year, I have been listening to these courses during my commute to and from work and have really enjoyed the classroom-style lectures in a variety of subjects such as literature, philosophy, religion and history. The materials are available in CD, cassette and DVD formats. Each lecture runs from 30 to 45 minutes. The courses come with a course guide to help you better understand the subject and follow up with reading on your own as well. The professors teaching the courses all come from very respected colleges and universities. The Great Courses will probably appeal to audiobook listeners who enjoy non-fiction titles and people who didn't get enough of these types of classes in college. I still listen to audiobooks in the car, but now I do it between classes.

Labels: Resources, Reviews by Jesse Pool

Spook Country, William Gibson's latest novel, was published last week. I noticed there was a lot of buzz on the Internet and on book blogs about the release. Curious about the excitement, I read reviews and e-mailed co-workers.

Nisi Shawl, writing for the Seattle Times, sums up Gibson's reputation nicely, he "was one of the founders of the 'cyberpunk' movement, the '80s literature of romanticized hackers and virtual reality that heralded today's wired world. Now more an impresario than a prognosticator, Gibson, a Vancouver, B.C. resident, continues to offer the thrill found in his earlier science fiction, that of learning what's around the next corner."

The "thrill of learning what's around the next corner"? Gibson is surely not unique among science fiction writers is presenting glimpses into the future. I wondered what distinguishes his writing. (Another question might be why do some writers of genre fiction have a larger appeal, beyond their usual "category"?)

Here's what Jesse Pool, Memphis Reads co-moderator and science fiction reader, thinks of Gibson's work: "As I understand it, Gibson has departed a little from his earlier work which was set about 40-60 years distant from the 1980's and his newer books are more 'day-after-tomorrow, although they are still very high tech in nature.

"As far as recommending him, I think he's a great author for people who like action-oriented [science fiction]. Gibson himself admits he knows little about computers, which is interesting in and of itself since he imagined virtual reality before we had it by watching kids play video games at the arcade. I find his characters are sometimes a little one dimensional, although several of them are very memorable. His books tend to be very dark and gritty, and also usually feature a world of difference between the haves and the have nots.

"I love the tone, the settings, especially the ideas, and wonder about the multicultural elements (most of his books I've read included some foreign culture, such as Rastafarians in space or Japanese teenie boppers)."

I cannot wait to try Gibson's latest for myself.

More:

LA Times review
Salon interview
Seattle Times interview
Vancouver Sun feature story/interview: "Like a magpie that plucks bright, shiny things off the road, [Gibson] picks up unusual words -- 'knurled' and 'spalled' and 'breakbulk' -- and invites the reader to enjoy their sparkle."


Several links used in this post via Gavin J. Grant's post for the Bookslut blog.

Labels: Reviews by Jesse Pool, Science Fiction

Fiction/Mainstream

Jesse Pool reviews A SPOT OF BOTHER by Mark Haddon (Doubleday, 2006)

Mark Haddon, author of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, has given us a novel about a dysfunctional English family coping the best it can with several simultaneous life-changing events. I found the book alternately heart-wrenching and hysterical.

Meet George Hall. George is a recent retiree and is also the patriarch of the Hall family. He's always kept to himself and is looking forward to taking up drawing again after he finishes building a shed in his garden. That is, of course, until he has "a spot of bother." George discovers a lesion on his leg one day and decides that he is dying of cancer, despite what the doctor says about it being eczema.

Jean, George's wife, has been having an affair with David, one of George's former co-workers. She feels torn between her loyalty to George, the adventurous life she dreams of having with David, and what her friends and relatives will think if she's found out.

Katie, George and Jean's daughter, is in her early 30s. She has a toddler son named Jacob. She also has a nasty temper. She's about to marry Ray, who is a wonderful provider and father-figure for Jacob. Unfortunately, Katie's parents don't really like Ray and, more importantly, she's not convinced that she's in love with him, either.

Jamie, Katie's brother, is young, successful and gay. Jamie's not sure how his father George feels about that, but his mother tries to be painfully hip about it. Jamie doesn't want to take his boyfriend Tony to Katie's wedding because he's afraid his family will put him off, but he may have to bring him to the wedding in order to keep him.

The story moves along as relationships among the characters are tangled, tested, broken and mended at dizzying speed. All the way to the end of the book, I wondered if things would work out for the best or if it would all end in disaster. Both outcomes seemed likely, and in a way, both would have been satisfying. I was not disappointed.


Jesse Pool, Highland Branch Library

Labels: Mainstream Fiction, Reviews by Jesse Pool

Fiction/Horror

Jesse Pool reviews CONSPIRACIES by F. Paul Wilson (Tom Doherty Associates, 1999)

Conspiracies is the third book in the Repairman Jack series by F. Paul Wilson. I chose to read it because it involves conspiracy theories and found that it worked fine as a stand alone book. That being said, I enjoyed it so much that I am eager to read the rest of the series.

Repairman Jack, a secretive private investigator, reluctantly takes on what should be a simple job looking for a missing person. Lew, a local businessman, wants Jack to track down his missing wife, Melanie. At first Jack refuses the job, but is hooked when Lew says a mysterious message he received from his wife Melanie said that only Repairman Jack could help her and Lew offers him a huge fee. The story gets weirder as Lew tells Jack that Melanie spoke to him through the television set and that she has gone missing just days before she was expected to reveal her Grand Unification Theory (GUT) to an organization of conspiracy theorists that Lew and Melanie belong to called the Society for the Exposure of Secret Organizations and Unacknowledged Phenomena, or SESOUP for short.

Initially, Jack reasons that one of the members of SESOUP may be responsible for her disappearance, but doesn’t know what to believe after meeting a diverse group of conspiracy buffs who believe in the New World Order, UFO’s, and Satanic ritual abuse cults. Jack’s cage gets rattled some more as he’s assaulted by a monkey and followed by a pair of Men in Black. Things get weirder and weirder as the hunt for Melanie continues. Jack receives some strange packages and people at the SESOUP convention begin having some serious nightmares that hint something larger is going on in the shadows.

Jesse Pool, Highland Branch Library

Labels: Horror, Reviews by Jesse Pool

Fiction/Young Adult Horror

Jesse Pool reviews BLOOD & CHOCOLATE by Annette Curtis Klause (Delacorte Press, 1997):

Vivian’s teenaged life is changed forever when fire destroys her family’s home in West Virginia, killing her father, who is also her pack leader. Vivian, like the rest of her family, is a werewolf. Her pack moves to a quiet suburb in Maryland to escape from whomever discovered their secret and set their home on fire. Although Vivian is expected to pair off from someone in her pack, she falls for a human “meat-boy” instead. She struggles with fitting in at school. She wonders how much of herself she should share with her new boyfriend Aiden and if doing so might endanger her pack. A series of unexplained murders, pack politics, and teenage angst complicate matters further. Growing up is hard, especially if you’re a teenaged werewolf.

Why You'll Love It!: Dark and edgy, Blood & Chocolate is fast-paced and character-driven with lots of action and romance.

You Might Also Like: Amelia Atwater-Rhodes; Alice Borchardt; Donna Boyd; Traci Briery; Laurell K. Hamilton; Susan Krinard; Sweet Blood by Pete Hautman; Companions of the Night by Vivian Vande Velde; The Blooding by Patricia Windsor


Jesse Pool, Highland Branch Library

Labels: Horror, Reviews by Jesse Pool, Young Adult