Book Review: The Debut

The Debut by Anita Brookner
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

A middle-aged academic reflects back on her lonely youth, frustrated by family demands. Bittersweet and humorous, this novel follows French literature student Ruth Weiss as she comes of age and attempts to separate from selfish immature parents.

"...she was expected to grow up as fast as she could decently manage it, and to this end was supplied with sad but improving books."

Nurtured for a time by her fraternal grandmother, Ruth discovers competence in the French language. She sets out to pursue an academic career, specializing in the writings of Balzac. Author Brookner shows an acrobatic deftness, gliding from one point-of-view to the next, handing off between characters with a fluid grace.

The imagery is rich, displayed in such passages as where Ruth describes old furniture "in dark woods which looked as if they had absorbed the blood of horses." Or where Ruth interacts with her aging mother, Helen, who "surveyed her daughter with eyes as impassive as those of an animal long in captivity."

In attempting to shape her own life, Ruth suffers a rueful moment of self reflection, wondering if she would always "react in the same way to those who did not want her, trying ever more hopelessly to please, while others, better disposed, went off unregarded?"

Despite a vague sense of time, I thought the characters were well-drawn, the dialogue neatly crafted, and the ending sad and inevitable, but seeded with wit. A satisfying read for those with a love of language and an appreciation for a clever turn-of-phrase.

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A Most Solemn Memorial Day

As a kid, I remember attending a Memorial Day parade in Wisconsin. Featured were men who'd survived the Bataan Death March eighteen years earlier. Bands played, people cheered, and the veterans, most in their forties, strolled down the street and waved. God knows what they thought of the horrendous brutality and starvation they'd undergone, or the absent comrades bayonetted because they'd collapsed with exhaustion. Still, that sunny day, sacrifices were recalled. By their presence, the survivors called to mind the fallen.

Today in the Philippines, there exists the Manilla American Cemetery. Here sits the largest gathering of Americans slain in World War II—a popular war, as such things go—consisting mostly of men killed in New Guinea and the Philippines, including on the Bataan Death March. Interred are 17, 184 dead. Also listed are the names of the missing, to the tune of 36, 286. (Among the dead are a number of Filipino Scouts.)

Here's one name from the roles of the deceased: Private James L. Aaron, U.S. Army, Service Number 14047056. Private Aaron was from Tennessee and served in the 31st Infantry Regiment. The 31st was one of the units that fought for months before finally surrendering to the Japanese. He may well have fought along side some of the men who walked in that parade almost two decades later. Starving, racked with dysentry, Private Aaron may well have been among those force-marched 65 miles from the peninsula of Bataan to San Fernando. Private Aaron may've perished on the Bataan Death March.

Today, Memorial Day seems memorable for being a long weekend and the unofficial start of summer and barbecues. Parades are reserved for winning sports teams, or, perhaps, the 4th of July. ("The dead? You mean like The Walking Dead? Seriously, dude, the dead?')

So today, just for a moment, I elect to remember Private Aaron and all the other Private Aarons who stood in the gap for our country during dark times, in less popular wars, who continue dying today.

May Perpetual Light shine upon them all.

Full Measure with Sharyl Attkisson

Story Du Jour #14

All Story Du Jour tales are available online and free! A small presentation in these trying times.

Brilliant Flash Fiction

"Michel" - by Cody Pease

677 words

Care and sorrow blend in a tale of the inevitable. 

Here's a sample of the writing:

"Days pass without warning, a monotonous routine. I lose myself in all of it. He sleeps past noon. Then I follow him as he ambles throughout the house, spraying the doorknobs and countertops, the stairway railing and armrests, wherever he lays his hands, wherever he breathes. I empty two bottles of cleaning spray within the first nine days since the hospital visit. I cook his meals: gluten-free, sugar-free, free of meat and eggs. I wash his clothes with scent-free detergent. I wash his body with only warm water, once in the morning and again at night. I buy a new bed, a firm bed to support his spine. Instead of wrapping myself around him and breathing in the nape of his neck, I keep two feet between us and hold his hand."

Soon more fiction.

Book Review: The Jack Vance Treasury

The Jack Vance Treasury by Jack Vance
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Grab you dictionary, it's Jack Vance! An old school master of sci-fi and fantasy, the author's Hugo and Nebula-award winning stories are included in this eighteen-tale anthology. Marvel at "The Dragon Masters," where an inquisitive Prince on a far-off world battles to hold his kingdom together in the face of a dragon war, the secretive politics of a powerful aloof race, and an alien invasion intent on enslaving humanity.

On another planet where everyone wears masks, a methodical official struggles to uncover the identify of a wanted assassin in "The Moon Moth." In "The Last Castle," a collection of spoiled sophisticates discovers the unpleasant truth that the lower orders have plans and goals that don't include the sophisticates.

In addition, several stories appear from Vance's Dying Earth canon. Set in a remote eon when our sun is a red giant, on the verge of guttering out, the selections feature picaresque protagonists afoot in a fragmented society of clannishness, bizarre customs, powerful magic, and sinister monstrosities capable of reason.

This book is best read on Kindle so as to take advantage of the dictionary function. Vance loved the English language, not to mention Old English, Latin and French. Prepare to encounter words such as "helminths," "nacre," and, a personal favorite, "nuncupatory" (obsolete.) Language and communication are themes in several Vance stories. And while the vocabulary can be vexing, it contributes to a depth and sense of place that enriches the author's unique works.

So sample the tales of Jack Vance. Enjoyment will eventuate.

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My Jack Vance obituary.

Story Du Jour #13

All Story Du Jour tales are available online and free! A small presentation in these trying times.

You decide if it leaves a mark.

Flash Bang Mysteries

"The 4th Amendment" - by John Bowers

731 words

Law clashes with order in a judge's chambers.  

Here's a sample of the writing:

Judge Martin sighed. “Your surveillance proves nothing. A beer party late at night, maybe a poker game. That’s likely all it was.”

 “Facial rec ID’d some of those men, your Honor. 

Known felons, a couple with Mob ties.”

 “Proves nothing. I’m sorry. Is there anything else?” 

 Carpenter stared at the judge in mounting frustration. “You’ve always been stingy with warrants, your Honor, but–” 

 “I believe in the Fourth Amendment. As should you.” 

“I do, of course, or I wouldn’t be asking for a warrant.” Carpenter leaned forward. “Look, your Honor, if Braxton is innocent, the search will only clear him. What’s the harm in that?”

“Nothing. But the Fourth clearly states that a search must be reasonable, with probable cause.”

Carpenter held up the warrant again. “I believe I have probable cause right here.” 

Another story will appear in a post much like this one very soon.

Pandemic Running

hikespeak

Finally, the trails in Griffith Park reopened and I can run somewhere other than around the block. Depression struck hard and I fell off all exercise the last few weeks. But now I'm rejuvenated and ready to build up my mileage once more.

I carry a mask, but don't wear it while running, relying on sunlight and fresh air to check the crafty Wuhan bug.

What will the future of racing be? Nowdays, runners may compete via the honor system in virtual races where they sign up, pay an entrance fee, run on their own, then receive finisher medals in the mail. A rather sterile endeavor. But I can't imagine any old-fashioned road races in the near future. This does dampen, but not extinguish, my marathon plans.

As a general note, I believe yesterday to be the most pre-pandemic day I've experienced since early March. Not only was traffic heavy, but I observed a maskless couple in a BMW zip into a handicapped parking space, run into a liquor store and buy cigarettes.

It's nice to see some of LA returning to normal.

Story Du Jour #12

All Story Du Jour tales are available online and free! A small presentation in these trying times.

Lowlife Literature

All Due Respect

"On the Edge" - by Sharon Diane King

1,228 words

Shrink vs shrink in a seedy motel with plenty of resentments to go around. 

Here's a sample of the writing:

McLeod paused, trying to even out his breath. He stared out the window at the thrashing ocean. The wooden balcony jutted out over the jagged rocks on the beach below. He’d been right to come. The perfect setting....

 “What is it you’d want me to say to you, Sandy?”

 “Truth’d be nice. For once.”

 McLeod grasped his cane and stood up slowly, gazing at the man with his back to him. “Okay, all right. You want the truth? Here’s a start. You were all about getting what you wanted, no matter what it took or who it hurt. From the day you rolled into town.”

 Sandy turned and stared at McLeod.

“You came here with all this hype, big city doctor settling down to a heartland practice. Your beauty pageant wife, your gifted kids. Your guitar, your garage band. Big fancy trips, RVs and motorcycles and new cars. Flashy stuff. Flash in the pan, more like. You used us all, so you could get everything you ever wanted.”


 Sandy smiled thinly. “Now, that wasn’t so hard, was it? You done?”

More fun fiction soon.

Book Review: Two Western Classics by Elmore Leonard

Elmore Leonard's Western Roundup #3: Valdez is Coming & Hombre by Elmore Leonard
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

A pair of novellas courtesy of Leonard, a master of action and the sage of terse economical prose. Back in the day, these tightly-crafted tales were both made into films.

Race, revenge, and romance propel "Valdez," the story of an upright sheriff seeking justice for the wife of a slain man. However, the cruel gunrunner most responsible for the death is uninterested in pleas for compensation from Roberto "Bob" Valdez. The gunrunner's vicious rebuff unleashes a series of violent events that terminates in a showdown with reputations and lives at stake. The narrative is made more complex by racial status and an unsolved murder. Crisp and fast-moving.

"Hombre" is but one of many names carried by John Russell, a Mexican boy stolen by Apaches, rescued and schooled by whites, who returns for a time to live among the Indians on a reservation. During a stage coach journey, Russell is shunned as an outcast by his fellow passengers. But when all lives are menaced by a gang of ruthless outlaws, Russell's warrior skills and knowledge of the desert make him the leader of the passengers, a group roiled by greed and conflicting loyalties. In this taut little saga, Leonard questions the emptiness of racial prejudice as well the tricky nature of who to help and when.

Two well-written compact stories for those catching up on their reading in uncertain times.

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Book Review: Irreal Fiction Focuses on Dreams

The Irreal Reader: Fiction & Essays from The Cafe Irreal by G.S. Evans
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

An anthology of short stories most strange, but that's the nature of irreal. Irreal is defined as "works of fiction in which physical reality reflects psychological reality in a manner that imitates the reality of a dream." Hence, the reader samples fragments both deeply personal and very international in their use of generally recognized symbols.

In these pages you'll encounter a doctor skilled at diagnosing love, the happenings in a town that caught a Minotaur, and a young man who receives a new father courtesy of the CIA.

I missed a great deal of the symbolism. But taken for what they are, the tales are overall intriguing. My main critque was the large number of essays in the back defining irreal, separating it from surreal, allegory or magical realism. While well-written and concise, the essays occupied around a third of the book. Like the literary style they explain, less is definitely more.

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Flash Fiction Hacks

Writing a Story in a Thousand Words or Less

I've got three such tales in the works right now. This two-minute video proved helpful in focusing in on what's important in a tiny tale. 

Melissa R.

The Power of a Single Positive Word

"Concentrated Humanity"

Viennese psychiatrist Viktor Frankl lost his family in the Nazi concentration camps. Later, he wrote a powerful book on his own experiences in Auschwitz and other hellish locales. Entitled Man's Search For Meaning, Frankl theorized that "the desire for meaning is more fundamental to the human experience even than the desire for pleasure or power."

If you're battling the pandemic blues, or shut-in with others who are down in the dumps, here is a six- minute clip with suggestions that could change your day for the better. 

Noetic Films