River of Time: A Memoir of Vietnam

#110
Title: River of Time: A Memoir of Vietnam
Author: Jon Swain
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
Year: 1995
Genre: memoir
291 pages

The subtitle appears only on the paperback edition. It's inaccurate since much of this memoir concerns Cambodia.

Swain is one of the reporters who covered the fall of Phnom Penh in the film The Killing Fields. His was the spare passport that the group unsuccessfully tried to counterfiet for Dith Pran. I've read a number of reviews that blast this account of Swain's time in Southeast Asia; most accuse him of admiring the Khmer Rouge (which is not supported by this text), of not writing a complete history (which is not the intention of this book), and/or of being a sybarite whose recollections are primarily of the opium and sex he enjoyed in the region. While it's true that he is nostalgic for his quondam pleasures, I saw very clearly that he contrasts his younger and more mature perspectives, that he counters the hedonism and cynicism of the pre-war period with the wars' horrific effects, and that what he longs for (as in so many narratives of transition) is an imagined gentleness and naivite. I'm certainly a feminist and have my own concerns about the genre of the war narrative as told by men, in which women are only gruff authorities, prostitutes, or protective mothers. However, Swain's narrative is much more complex than that, and often succeeds in showing the transformation of peoples and countries as well as of Swain himself.

Pigeons: The Fascinating Saga of the World's Most Revered and Reviled Bird

#109
Title: Pigeons: The Fascinating Saga of the World's Most Revered and Reviled Bird
Author: Andrew D. Blechman
Publisher: Grove Press
Year: 2006
Genre: Natural history
244 pages

At the close of the book, Blechman acknowledges that when he began, he was more interested in writing about people obsessed with pigeons than the pigeons themselves. This was an interesting confirmation of my impression that pigeons were a secondary focus pretending to be primary. Yes, the text itself balances the birds with the breeders and racers, but despite Blechman's ultimate advocacy for pigeons, the impression that he finds them unpleasant keeps breaking though. This happens in a variety of ways. First, Blechman is obsessed by pigeon droppings. There are few descriptions of pigeons or their habitats that do not feature a repetitive marveling at their droppings, which Blechman and others quoted persist in referring to as "crap" and "shit." Second, despite some efforts to review the history of the pigeon and provide interesting facts, Blechman's heart clearly isn't in it. He is much more interested in the seemingly all-male world of pigeon afficionados of various kinds, describing members of secretive pigeon-shooting clubs with more appaqrent affection than he has for the birds. Third, while Blechman's words decry violence against pigeons, he devotes a fair number of pages to people who shoot them, poison them, steal them, and butcher them. He does a poor job of commenting on what could have been the crux of the book--the public's ambivalence about pigeons--and instead merely seems to enact that ambivalence, despite his stated intentions. Despite containing a fair amount of information, the book winds up feeling empty; this is not helped by an empty chapter about failing to talk to Mike Tyson (who owns pigeons).

For a narrative about another urban pest, including eradication efforts but conveying deeper regard and respect, read Sullivan's Rats: Observations on the History and Habitat of the City's Most Unwanted Inhabitants (which also features a cool cover of a rat, pendant, composed of a city map).

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?

 
#108
Title: Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
Author: Philip K. Dick
Publisher: Del Rey
Year: 1968/1982
Genre: Science Fiction
220 pages

The linked cover is one from a more recent run from the same publisher. My edition, like the one pictured, is actually titled Blade Runner (Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep), but that's a movie tie-in title, not Dick's. The novel and the film have about as little in common as Le Guin's Earthsea Trilogy and the Sci-Fi Channel's loosely based, made-for-television movie Earthsea. There are some characters and action elements in common, but very different plots and emotional foci. Like Dick's A Scanner Darkly and Valis, there is considerable confusion between characters' selves and a larger consciousness that is the manifestation of a larger than life, perhaps unnatural intelligence; blurred identities; and at least one character who may be psychotic and/or may correctly perceive artifice and deception by people and systems. Unlike Blade Runner, which is primarily an exterior, action-adventure narrative, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? devotes considerable attention to the characters' concerns about consciousness and empathy, and plays with the reader's identification with characters over time. Like much of Dick's work, it does not answer the questions it poses about artifice versus the numinous, but instead sustains the reader's identification with the characters beyond the end of the book by letting the mystery stand.

Another Day in the Frontal Lobe: A Brain Surgeon Exposes Life on the Inside

#107
Title: Another Day in the Frontal Lobe: A Brain Surgeon Exposes Life on the Inside
Author: Katrina Firlik
Publisher: Random House
Year: 2006
Genre: Medical, memoir, education
273 pages

A well-written and easy to follow account of Firlik's training as a neurosurgeon (she was the first woman admitted to her neurosurgery residency). The narrative is more of a gloss plus clinical highlights than a more in-depth account lof her training; it is not especially psychological, though she does highlight the developmental turning points associated with the residency. There is some material, but not much, about the relationships between surgeons (either specific people or categorical groups), but a reasonable amount about what working with different patients has meant to her. Firlik tells a good neurology tale, and I would have liked more of them. Read with Working in a Very Small Place: The Making of a Neurosurgeon for another neurosurgery narrative, with Complications: A Surgeon's Notes on an Imperfect Science for another general surgical training narrative, and with The Scalpel and the Silver Bear: The First Navajo Woman Surgeon Combines Western Medicine and Traditional Healing and Forged by the Knife: The Experience of Surgical Residency from the Perspective of a Woman of Color for women surgeons' accounts with the added aspect of culture and ethnicity.

Water for Elephants

#106
Title: Water for Elephants
Author: Sara Gruen
Publisher: Algonquin
Year: 2006
Genre: Fiction
350 pages

Water for Elephants was an enjoyable novel with well-written characters who inspire identification and empathy. The setting and historical circumstances seem to be reasonably well-researched, and the plot moves along nicely. I read it in one sitting, which is unusual these days. The author has said that the story references the biblical story of Jacob, but I didn't pick this up at all, and don't see it now that I've learned of her intention. If it's there, it's weak and not well-executed. Read this with Geek Love and Freaks: We Who Are Not as Others for circus saturation; read it with Ironweed for the context of the Depression's aftermath and a different peripatetic experience.

The Awful End of Prince William the Silent: The First Assassination of a Head of State with a Handgun

#104
Title: The Awful End of Prince William the Silent: The First Assassination of a Head of State with a Handgun
Author: Lisa Jardine
Publisher: Harper Perennial
Year: 2005
Genre: history
176 pages

In some ways this is less about the actual assassination of William the Silent than about the context of his death, including the means (the relatively new wheel-lock pistol), the political climate, and the religious conflicts of 16th-century Europe. The assassination itself occupies a very small portion of this volume.

Those who did not take a survey course on European or British history or the Rennaisance, or those who had trouble understanding the political machinations that preceded those fictionalized in Neal Stephenson's Baroque Cycle, will find the first chapter useful; it provides a not-too-dry overview of the Protestant/Catholic conflicts, particularly in relation to the Low Countries. Chapter 2 treats the murder itself. After that, the order of the book is puzzling. It backtracks to discuss a previous attempt on William's life, then a discourse on the history and characteristics of the wheel-lock pistol, then two chapters with non-linear chronologies on Elizabeth I, followed by primary sources in the appendices (most notably, the fatwa against William issued by Phillip II).

The chapters that actually narrate daily events are more interesting than the chapters that present a broader historical portrait; the latter suffer as all surveys do from being a blur of names and policies. That the text is not chronological adds some confusion and difficulty orienting oneself. The author's comparisons of the events to contemporary political conflicts, while interesting, might better have been served up as a final chapter that emphasized both the historical import of the assassination and its contemporary relevance. Still and all, this was an enjoyable book, and I'll watch for more from Lisa Jardine in the future.

Don't Try This at Home: Culinary Catastrophes from the World's Greatest Chefs

#105
Title: Don't Try This at Home: Culinary Catastrophes from the World's Greatest Chefs
Authors: Kimberly Witherspoon & Andrew Friedman
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Year: 2005
Genre: Food, memoir
319 pages

I'll admit that though I'm a very good cook, and with my partner own somewhere in the neighborhood of 130 cookbooks, I don't own cookbooks by any of the chefs represented in this collection. I have nothing against them, but I've never heard of most of them. This means that I read the anthology without a picture of anyone (except Anthony Bourdain) or any orienting knowledge of them. Not a Julia Child, Marcella Hazan, Marian Burros, Mark Bittman, or Nigella Lawson in sight.

The 41 authors vary significantly in their capacity to tell a story and evoke either empathy or laughter. Puzzlingly, the entries are in alphabetical order by author, which means that the stories aren't grouped thematically or interwoven by theme--there is no narrative arc. The only rationale I can ascribe this to is that this way, none of the authors would feel snubbed. This seems emblamatic of something that's mostly missing from this collection, acknowledgement that the chefs themselves may cause their staff members to experience disasters. You'd hardly know from these naratives how unpleasant and self-absorbed some chefs can be.

In addition, the 'disasters' range from true disasters (a back-seat slosh that rivals some of the restaurant scenes in Fight Club for the disgust it inspires) to non-disasters (a famous person is supposed to show up for dinner, and does) to did-you-understand-the-question? stories (it's funny to pull pranks on other cooks).

The collection was interesting enough to read, but not something I'd be likely to remember in the long-term. There are better stories to be had in books by individual cooks and chefs.

Eat, Pray, Love: One Woman's Search for Everything Across Italy, India and Indonesia

 
#103
Title: Eat, Pray, Love: One Woman's Search for Everything Across Italy, India and Indonesia
Author: Elizabeth Gilbert
Publisher: Penguin
Year: 2007
Genre: memoir, travel
334 pages

I have tried hard to like this memoir/travelogue. Why are there so many books by 30-ish folks complaining about their lives, then offering wisdom that is at best simplistic and at worst immature? Perhaps, as I've mentioned already in these reviews, the problem is that I have become a curmudgeon. Whatever the reason, however, I found it hard to like Liz. She is tediously insecure and neurotic. If her self-depiction is accurate, I doubt I'd find her socially attractive. While I sympathize about her ugly and expensive divorce, and I'm happy on her behalf that she can afford to travel the world for a year in her early 30's, I am uncomfortable with some of the unspoken class subtext (which might remind one of the economic uneasiness occasioned by Under the Tuscan Sun), as well as the overall depiction of people from other countries as more romantic, exotic, wise, etc. than one's compatriots. The author might have been better served by a directive from her Guru to stay at home and pay attention rather than flee, or (since we all have the option to flee), at least not to write a book about it.

I keep trying to articulate why this book so rubs me the wrong way; the closest I can get is that the author's anxiety is wearying. Does this mean that her adventures aren't interesting, or that she doesn't have anything to say, or that I stopped reading? No, but I could never really lose myself in the story, or develop much empathy for the narrator. The author is a magazine writer, which means her prose is relatively clean, but her sentiments are cloying.

The book is, I think, intended to be inspirational. However, the tale unfolds too simplistically, yet with assertions of its own complexity and meaningfulness. I found it unfortunately superficial and reductive.

Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die

#102
Title: Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die
Author: Chip Heath & Dan Heath
Publisher: Random House
Year: 2007
Genre: Business, education
291 pages

An easy to read and palatable example of its genre (it thinks it's social psychology, but it seems more pitched to management than anything else), Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die teaches a basic paradigm related to the "stickiness" of ideas, and how to make them stickier. The authors open with some urban legends, then analyze them to show why they stick--that is, why people remember them and find them highly salient. It goes on to situate itself in the context of Malcolm Gladwell's discussion of "The Stickiness Factor" in The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference.

The book is distinguished from many of its ilk in that it does not seem to exist for the purpose of helping the reader to deceive others (i.e., as do many texts on advertising techniques), it draws from a variety of credible empirical and theoretical sources, and it has benign applications outside the realm of economics. I can easily see ways to incorporate their basic ideas into lesson plans, especially lessons that would help my students design promotional materials, report findings, or direct clientele to the agencies at which they train. While my copy is as full of marginal notes as any non-fiction I read, more of my comments reflect my engagement with the material rather than any substantive dispute with it.

I was pleased to see references to Lakoff and Johnson's Metaphors we Live By, not because I agree with all of their contentions, but because it evokes my pleasant college experiences of ferociously discussing this then-new book with Jonathan and Frederic, now both gone.

Cambridge Studies in Medical Anthropology #1: Social Lives of Medicines

 

#101
Title: Cambridge Studies in Medical Anthropology #1: Social Lives of Medicines
Authors: Susan Reynolds Whyte, Sjaak van der Geest, & Anita Hardon
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Year: 2003
Genre: anthropology, medicine
208 pages 

A professional/technical text in medical anthropology, but still accessible to the interested lay reader. It approaches the meaning of pharmaceuticals and medical technologies (materia medica) in different cultural contexts, including developed as well as developing countries. The authors hold the tension between patients' uncritical trust of doctors' knowledge, and doctors' (and other medical personnels') actual knowledge. My conclusion based on the book is that no one knows much of anything in actual practice, and that we are far more likely to make medical decisions based on cultural salience and analogy than on any sort of objective appraisal or pharmacokinetics and mechanisms of action. There is an excellent chapter on rural injectionists that should be required reading for people involved in HIV and hepatitis reduction. Dry, but worth it. A good companion to Craig's Familiar Medicine: Everyday Health Knowledge and Practice in Today's Vietnam, which I'll get around to finishing and review one of these days.