springdellgirl

Book Reviews #61 and #62

Have you noticed that so many great new books have just come out? I seriously have a reading list a mile long of fantastic books I have been waiting forever to come out. But before I get to all those great new books I have had a few that I have needed to finish. Here are two:

Book Review #61 The Ladies Auxilary by Tova Mirvis



This was the pick for September for my church book club. It sounded interesting and I was excited to read it. This book is an enigma to me in many ways. Just when I think I have formed an opinion about it...wham...my opinion changes.

From Publishers Weekly:

The world of this confident, insightful debut novel is the tightly knit Orthodox Jewish community of Memphis, Tenn., a social structure that unravels when an unconventional New York convert settles there with her five-year-old daughter. Newly widowed Batsheva Jacobs is both shockingly modern and fervently spiritual. She lovingly raises her daughter, Ayala, in the Orthodox tradition, but she sings loudly and enthusiastically at shul (perhaps a sign of unseemly ego), visits the mikvah to cleanse herself (an act that raises eyebrows, since she has no husband), and she wears flowing clothes that show her figure. All of which is noted suspiciously by the local women whose common goal is to preserve tradition...Taking a job as art teacher at the girls' school, blonde, green-eyed Batsheva is soon a beloved confidante of the community's female teenagers, but when she allows them to wear makeup and miniskirts on a ski trip, and becomes close to the Rabbi's beloved 22-year-old son, she's the subject of cruel gossip. Caught in the middle are Ayala and the respected and goodhearted Mimi Rubin, the rabbi's wife, who begins to believe rumors about her son's attachment to Batsheva, and panics. Generous with humor and compassion, Mirvis paints tenderly nuanced portraits of strong female characters while scrutinizing an entrenched religious subculture whose traditions are threatened by modern temptations. Guilt, passion, prejudice, loneliness and independence are common themes in Jewish literature and are explored with sensitivity in a gentle story that captures its milieu with tolerant understanding, and plucks the heartstrings.

When I first started this book I had a really hard time getting into it. There are about 20 main characters and none of them are the narrator exactly. The story is told in first-person plural which took a bit to get into plus the pace of the book is very slow. For the first third of the book I really didn't care for it and was very tempted to put it down and pick up something else. But I persevered since it was for a book club. By half way through I liked it. The book describes in detail the beliefs, holidays, rituals, spiritual practices, morals and values of Orthodox Judaism. I found this fascinating...truly. Mirvis does an exceptional job of describing these to the non-Jewish and non-informed reader.

By the end of the book I really liked it. As a religious person who has lived in a religious community I found that I could relate to the book and the women of the Ladies Auxilary. How easily comparisons can be drawn to people of my own faith in ways both good and bad. Mirvis does a great job of looking objectively at this community (one she was raised in) and not just viewing it through rose-colored glasses. There are characters who are self-righteous; characters who are religious purely out of habit and tradition; characters who just go through the motions and are afraid to ask themselves what they truly believe; and characters who are unaccepting of outsiders and those who deviate from the "norm". But there are also characters who are warm, loving, supportive who truly live their religion and exude that warm sense of "community".

I also found myself feeling a rejuvenation for my own religion. Last week in Family Home Evening Tyler and I were talking to our kids about how they needed to start preparing for Sunday on Saturday night so that Sunday would be a much more peaceful day. I grabbed my book and read the section on how the women prepare for Shabbos (the Sabbath) and how they set it apart from other days and make it holy. For instance... they light their candles, park their cars, shut off TV, don't answer the phone, dress nicely, have dishes they only use on the Sabbath, special foods they eat etc.

"We reserve the day for God and for family...and spend it in a peaceful pattern of prayers, meals and relaxation. The outside world vanishes, even if only for one day" (pgs. 18-19)

Our kids really got inspired and came up with some great ideas for things we could implement in our own family to make the Sabbath day holy.

In our book club we had a great discussion about the questions this book raises. The one that struck me the most is...how does one raise a religious child to become a religious adult? Most parents want their children to be religious in the same way they are...I am no exception. But there really isn't any way to ensure that your children will be religious in the same way that their parents are...no matter how much we wish there was. Our children are individuals who learn and grow at their own pace and take their own path to spirituality...just like we did.

The ideas of this book have stayed with me for over a week now. Having had more time to digest the concepts and ideas I am finding this book to be even more meaningful. While not a quick read or a page-turner I found this book to be a gentle contemplative reminder of how we ...the collective we...are more alike than we are different and I am left feeling a deeper connection to my own spirituality.

My rating: Good...meaningful.

Book Review #62 The Actor and the Housewife by Shannon Hale



Oh Shannon Hale...I try to like you...I really do. I give you chance after chance and guess what? I just don't. I know I am in the minority especially in my little subculture of the world but you're just not my...as you would annoyingly say..."cup of herbal tea". I found this book to be so "gosh darn" full of sugary cliched Happy Valley Mormonism that my teeth hurt and I wanted to vomit.

From Amazon.com:

What if you were to meet the number-one person on your laminated list—you know, that list you joke about with your significant other about which five celebrities you’d be allowed to run off with if ever given the chance? And of course since it’ll never happen it doesn’t matter… Mormon housewife Becky Jack is seven months pregnant with her fourth child when she meets celebrity hearththrob Felix Callahan. Twelve hours, one elevator ride, and one alcohol-free dinner later, something has happened…though nothing has happened. It isn’t sexual. It isn’t even quite love. But a month later Felix shows up in Salt Lake City to visit and before they know what’s hit them, Felix and Becky are best friends. Really. Becky’s husband is pretty cool about it. Her children roll their eyes. Her neighbors gossip endlessly. But Felix and Becky have something special…something unusual, something completely impossible to sustain. Or is it? A magical story, The Actor and the Housewife explores what could happen when your not-so-secret celebrity crush walks right into real life and changes everything.

OK...I'm having to stifle a gag just reading that. I thought this book would be the "delightful romp" that it claimed to be but it wasn't. The main character, Becky Jack, truly is the MOST annoying of characters. She's just knocked Bella from Twilight down a few notches. She is such a Utah LDS stereotype. You disappoint me Shannon Hale.

First...the plot. The book is basically about Becky and her crush British actor, Felix (who in my book looks just like Hugh Grant) and their emotional affair. I wanted to scream as Becky was titillated every time Felix called, how her little pudgy heart just skipped a beat whenever she heard his voice but she would then go on and on about how much she "loved" her good old dependable husband Mike. Me thinks the lady doth protest too much. Shannon Hale tells us over and over again...ad naseaum...about how much Becky loves Mike and how her marriage is her number one priority yet Becky's actions tell a far different story. Each time Hale would have Becky say how much she loved Mike in the next breath she would then have Becky go off on how she and Felix were "soulmates". Ugh. I found myself asking throughout the whole book "Couldn't Felix do better than you? You are a bore...and a stereotype." And...not a very flattering stereotype, Ms. Hale, of LDS women.

Second, the characters are so uninteresting, except for Felix, and completely unrealistic. The husband Mike after putting up with so much from his wife and her infatuation/relationship with Felix he finally reaches the end of his rope and tells her...that he "just doesn't understand." What!?! That's it? Call her out Mike!!" I wanted to yell. Grow some balls and a spine while you're at it!! I don't know what most of the readers husbands are like but mine would put up with behavior like that for exactly two seconds and vice versa. I kept wanting Mike to find a nice sexy blond big boobed co-worker and claim her to be his "soulmate" and see how frumpy old zucchini bread baking Becky liked it. Probably not so much.

Third, was this book written for the masses or did I miss the LDS lit label? Because Ms. Hale assumes that your average reader is in on all the LDS/Utah insight and most are not. I couldn' t stand her description of how the city of Layton is pronounced...inside joke to Utah readers only. When Becky goes in to talk to her Bishop and she says that she has read a bunch of "Conference Talks" I'm sure the non-LDS reader has no clue what she is talking about...and these are just a few examples.

Now that said there were some parts of this book where the dialogue between Becky and Felix was humorous...but then it never let up...every single time they spoke to one another it was in this obnoxious banter that I felt was contrived. Most of us have a friend or two were we riff off one another but then we can stop...it isn't endlessly ongoing. It got really old.

The ending was pure torture. After all of the jerking around of the reader and the manipulating of our emotions (not to mention the offing of a main character) the ending blows. Really. Did we just go on that nausea inducing roller coaster ride for this. As I stared in disbelief at the last few pages what did Becky do? She giggled and guffawed and chortled and chuckled. How funny that after 11 years for them and a grueling 350 pages for me we find ourselves here. Lame.

I know I am in the minority here and that lots of people who I respect liked this book but I didn't. Truth be told I despised it. I liked the premise but was disappointed with the product. Can men and women be friends...perhaps...just not "soul mates" if they are married to other people. But that's just my opinion. So here's where the rubber meets the road. Good-bye Shannon Hale.

My rating: Too cheesy; too contrived; and too "Happy Valley" for me. I hated it.