5 comments about Monique and the Mango Rains: Two Years with a Midwife in Mali.

1. This is a delightful book, made more special by the fact that it is a true story. Kris is a skilled writer who captures the sense of life in Mali and the personality of her beloved Monique. I am glad she decided to tell her story: I will never forget it, or Monique...



2. Outstanding!! This book will emmerse and transport you to Mali Africa where you'll experience the conditions and culture of the sweet people that live there. Told indearingly by Kris Holloway the writer and peace corp volunteer who lived this wonderful journey with a friend made in afar away place... as one who is just beginning to explore the possibility of traveling to Africa as a missionary I found this book to be informative & enlightening...



3. Monique's life story is inspirational. Her example shows what great things one can achieve even in humble circumstances. Author Kris Holloway gives readers an intimate view into the lives of women in West Africa--very eye-opening for me. I found myself cheering for their success!



4. What if you lives in a country where, if you are a woman, you have a 1 in 12 chance of dying in childbirth? What if you are expected to have three, four, five children? What if a complication means being bundled on the back of a moped and being driven fast to the nearest larger village, where the nearest real medical care is?
   
   The author of this fine book, Kris Holloway, spent 2 years with the Peace Corps living in a remote village in Mali. This story is the amazing tale of her friendship with Monique, a midwife who - although only 3 years her senior - was the only medical care most people in her village would ever see.
   
   The story progresses from Kris' early moments being drawn in by Monique's personality and dedication, to an unexpected conclusion that is all too common in the world of Monique. A book I was prepared to not enjoy, I found myself drawn into it. With the plot structure a total shambles, with time jumping months in a matter of sentences with no warning, the book rather focuses in on Monique and her situation. A relatively short book at 200 pages, it successfully paints the picture of a woman who is fully aware of her situation as midwife in a sub-Saharan African village, and faces that with a striking combination of fatalistic acceptance and entrepreneurial will to change the fate of women in her village.
   
   This story should be read by all Westerners, if only to contrast the sanitized birthing process we experience with the trials found in most of the rest of the world.



5. Monique and the Mango Rains is the moving account of Kris Holloway's experiences as a Peace Corps volunteer in Mali, West Africa, assisting Monique Dembele, the area's local midwife and medical worker. In the crippling poverty of Mali, Monique and Kris work to help Mali's women and children in times of medical distress. From the birthing of babies to relationship counselling, fending off disease and infection to nutrition education, Monique labors ceaselessly and tirelessly. Her work builds a reputation far and wide that draws women from distant villages seeking her expert help. Kris, while adapting to her harsh environment, becomes more than just an assistant to Monique, experiencing with her the joy of her work and her relationships with the local women. She shares the anguish and disappointment of Monique's life outside the clinic and the close bond of her host family in Africa, becoming a friend to this inspiring woman. As Monique and Kris work to bring education and information to the women, they must broach sensitive topics like birth-control, AIDS, and abolishment of female circumcision. These topics, foreign to the local women, directly affect the survival of the community, and they work tirelessly to educate and inform the women while still dealing with the malnutrition, illness, and injury that besiege them every day.
   
   The candid portrayal of life in the small village was very informative and interesting. I learned a great deal about the regions politics, the African society, and the general day to day existence of the small provincial village. The backbreaking work that the community must endure to prepare for the seasonal rains that fortify their village was explained in rich detail, making the story of the community's struggle for their survival come alive to the reader. Every hand is needed to plant and harvest the life giving crops that will sustain the villagers in the dry season. Monique's inexhaustible commitment to her patients and to her family was awe-inspiring. Her work to repair the birthing house, her bi-weekly weighing of babies, and her educational instruction to mothers for the care of their children was invaluable to the women of her community. Monique's story, though inspirational, was also fraught with sadness. The relationship between her and her husband, who she only calls le gars (the guy) is upsetting and one-sided. While Monique provides the money, care and stability, her husband takes and takes from her, never realizing the treasure that he is entrusted with. Monique works long and trying hours at the clinic, barely scraping by financially, with her young son tied to her back. Though at times the story was sad, there were real moments of joy and laughter throughout this book, from the triumphant birth of twins in an area where a double birth is almost unheard of, to Monique's musings on an airplane ride, I found myself smiling and laughing with Kris and Monique. Monique and Kris's friendship continued even after Kris's time in the peace corps ended, and straddled two different continents and many years.
   
   This was a remarkable story of a remarkable woman. It encompassed the difficulties, differences and uniqueness of African culture that goes unnoticed by most Americans. I found Monique to be a fascinating woman who gave her heart and soul to the people who relied on her for their daily survival. This book was written in part to document the work that Kris did at Monique's side, but more than this, it was written as a homage to her great friend Monique. Monique truly touched Kris's life, and upon reading this book, I found she touched mine as well. Wonderful book, highly recommended.

5 comments about Girl, Interrupted.

1. It's actually one of the better memoirs of recent vintage (it came out in 1993 and became a bestseller in 2000, with the film's release). Not that SK is very insightful about her `borderline personality' disorder, nor capable of extended moments of insight nor poetry, but she compensates for her lack of great craftsmanship in wordplay and sentence/paragraph construction with a daring approach to the memoir.
   
   The book, with larger than normal print, is not even 170 pages in the Vintage edition I read, and there's plenty of white space, as well as transcripts of SK's mental diagnoses within. In a sense, this sets up the piece to be quite poetic. In fact, this is where the poesy of the prose comes from, not the ability to craft gorgeous prose. Most of the few dozen `chapters' are brief- 3-4 pages is usual, and they are often dreamy or hazy recollections that sometimes briefly, violently come into focus, in describing a fellow patient's ill or death. In other chapters SK goes off rambling about mental ills, philosophy, her sexual precocity, and other things. While many of these individual reminiscences and airies fall flat, the way they are woven together and contrast with each other allow make the whole greater than the sum of its parts.
   
   This synergy got me to thinking of a poetic equivalent, and the manifest answer was the long Maximus poem series by Charles Olson- another Massachusetts resident. In that poem series, one of the few `experimental' works of poetry that actually coheres and is good, CO strings together many poems about his hometown, yet each poem/stanza is, in a sense, lacking- it fails as an individual work because it is incomplete. Yet, read one after the other the incomplete figurines each `poem' makes connect up. It's like looking at a single Matissean line on a piece of tissue paper. The individual curves and twists seem random until you lay each tissue paper over the next. Then, the full, intricate, and interesting picture emerges. Such it was in CO's poem sequence, and such it is in SK's memoir- each `chapter' a single line, sometimes non-chronological, that gives a better representation of her mindset than any straightforward prose could. Interestingly, in looking up reviews of the book, I was struck by how not a single published review (at least those online) ever mentioned this, even though the form of the book jumped out at me. This is evidence of piss poor criticism. It's akin to reviewing the first edition of Walt Whitman's Leaves Of Grass, dismissing it as smutty, and not even commenting on the breakthrough structure of the free verse.
   
   There is little bitching, and poseur pity.... In short, Girl, Interrupted is a very good work, and what any memoirist should strive to achieve. The very fact that many critics criticized it for, when boiled down, not filling their conventional needs as a reader, and chose to review it against what what they wanted (expected) it to be, argues for its specialness, and I'd bet that it will be read long after Prozac Nation or A Heartbreaking Work Of Staggering Genius have gone out of print. Smile at that, Susanna.



2. This was...senseless jibberjaw..Truly that is the only word that comes to mind. The movie was wonderful, but I can see now that it was very loosely based on this book.. It took a few characters and added on to their personalities.. the book was mostly just rambling and opinions. Half of the interesting things that occured in the movie were not in this book. Those that love the movie will be greatly disapointed in this. I would also like to add, you will have in completely read in one or two sittings.



3. On the first page of her novel(?), Susanna Kaysen says she had to live for two years in a "parallel universe" when she became a patient in a psychiatric hospital. In the chapter "Elementary Topography," she poses a question, how did I get to be in here?
   The answer she gives, other than her being delusional, is that she was in a "state of contrariety." She goes on, "All of my integrity seemed to lie in saying No."
   Two other chapters bear witness to the adversarial character of her illness, "Velocity vs. Viscosity," which deals with her obsessive thought patterns, and "Mind vs. Brain:"
   "Whatever we call it--mind, character, soul--we like to think it possesses something that is greater than the sum of its neurons, and that 'animates' us."
   In yet another chapter, Kaysen derides her former therapist, who was named "Melvin," and who was to become her analyst. She acts like she tolerated him as someone imposed on her, and says that she "felt sorry for him" on account of his funny name. In an internal memo, however, a nurse reported that she experienced extreme anxiety over her therapist being absent.
   Part of Kaysen's "state of contrariety," then, must be seen in the light of an abject, back-against-the-wall helplessness caused by the mental illness. I pity Kaysen for her interrupted life. Her novel makes a compelling case for mental-illness research.
   In the Charleston County Library, >Girl, Interrupted< is located in the "Young Adult Fiction" section, which is inappropriate for such a rough, lurid story.



4. Susanna Kaysen shares an episodic account of her two-year stay in a mental institution during her late teens. She recounts the ailments and behavior which led her to the hospital, while also questioning her diagnosis of Borderline Personality Disorder, as well as the manner in which mental illnesses are treated. In order to portray her experience and the experiences of the other young women she encountered within the institution accurately, Kaysen recounts a variety of occurrences, ranging from the grim to the lighthearted. Among Kaysen's recollections are one girl's experience with shock therapy, her own attempt to bite into her hand to ensure that she is "real," and the girls' humorous outing to an ice cream shop.
   
   Copies of Kaysen's medical records are juxtaposed against her personal accounts, often making the tone of the former documents unsettlingly cold and detached. Her personal account is often moving, and even the logic Kaysen uses to explain some of her most unusual behavior can make sense. At the same time, she strives for a relatively objective account of her interaction with mental health professionals. Kaysen presents a strong case to support her belief that the line between "normalcy" and mental illness is often muddied,--a thought she summarizes beautifully at the beginning of the book, writing that "Every window in Alcatraz has a view of San Francisco"-- without becoming overly critical of those who diagnosed and treated her.



5. Having PTSD myself from Wars and other things, I thought this was a great movie! I didn't read the book first however and normally I do but from what I gather the movie in this instance was much better than the book...
   
   I have read One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest and in many ways this reminded me of that, only in the setting of a female dominated one vice a male one....
   
   Maybe in the future if time permits I will read the book itself to see if the movie which I have already seen and truly thought was great stacks up...
   
   If not...
   
   It was that book which inspired the movie and it's a great movie...
   
   And mental illness isn't just something that people are born with, some times they receive it through traumatic experiences such as tragedies or war or the like...
   
   In my opinion it is something that really needs to be given far more attention than it is receiving and this movie sheds light on it like few have...
   
   Your Chance to Hear The Last Panther Speak

5 comments about Garlic and Sapphires: The Secret Life of a Critic in Disguise.

1. I read this book for our book club and thoroughly enjoyed it. It was meant to be somewhat lighter than some things we'd been reading lately and it was that; but it was also enlightening about ourselves and how we treat others. The recipes are wonderful! I've highlighted the recipe index so I can turn right to them!



2. I was very disappointed in this audio CD book. First of all, something about this book seems very self-indulgent. For example, CD1 goes on endlessly about how the author doesn't really want this top job, but of course, she interviews and ends up with it. It seems very disingenous. Second, stories from a job of eating out at mostly very fancy restaurants seems pretty irrelevant in 2008, when most people are struggling to pay their monthly bills and save for retirement. Listening for 20 minutes to someone describe perfect buckwheat noodles is rather tiresome. Third, and perhaps most importantly, the publisher has chosen a reader who is very dramatic and overly inflects each and every voice. She mimics a 4 year old child, a portly Yankee editor, old Jewish men, the author, a haughty, constipated sounding friend (Claudia),Italian waiters, etc. I guess some listeners might enjoy this, but it personally drove me bonkers. A matter of personal preference, I guess. Be careful you can handle this type of a narration before you opt for the audiobook.



3. I loved this engaging memoir by the New York Times food critic. I particularly enjoy Reichl's egalitarian view of fine dining (everyone should have the same great experience, famous or not). As a lover of good food and fine dining, I found this to be a very entertaining read.



4. During the 1990s, Ruth Reichel was the restaurant critic for the New York Times. When she began the job, she realized that a majority of the restaurants she would be reviewing knew what she looked like and were on the lookout for her. Therefore, she created a number of disguises for herself using clothing, wigs, and makeup. I highly recommend this book for an enlightening look at how Ruth's costumes changed the way people treated her as well as the effect on Ruth herself.
   
   I found it intriguing how Ruth took on other personalities almost without trying to. When she dressed as her mother she found herself ordering the foods her mother liked, and criticizing and returning foods to the kitchen as her mother would. My favorite character was Brenda. She wore a long and oddly scruffy carrot red wig that made her look rumpled and sleepy as if she had just climbed out of bed. She wore bright colored clothing, large colorful eyeglasses, and lipstick painted on bigger than her own lips. The way people treated her was different and wonderful. They smiled at her and talked to her. They wanted to spend time with her. They wished her well. Ruth states "Brenda was my best self, the person I've always wanted to be. She was generous and funny, optimistic and smart. She was kind. I hoped that finding the Brenda inside me would not always require a wig." See the end of this review for Ruth's comments during an interview about wearing disguises.
   
   I also loved Ruth's artistic and sensual descriptions of food. Personally, I am not into food and I cook as little as possible. So I was surprised that I was entertained with her eating experiences and her knowledge of food. Some examples follow.
   
   P 86 regarding oysters. She said "You can't eat these. They've been out of the water too long. See how dry it is? An oyster should have abundant liquid in the shell. See how dull it is? When an oyster first comes out of the water, it is shiny, luminescent. It looks like this moonstone. But the longer an oyster is out of the water, the duller it becomes. This, as you can see, has no shine at all."
   
   P 60 regarding a japanese noodle restaurant: "It takes a magician to make soba. They are made of buckwheat, which has no gluten. That means that getting them to hold together is an act of will."
   
   More than once during this book I thought about truth being stranger than fiction. For example, Mr. Shapiro purchased a dinner with the author through a charity fundraising auction. He bragged to her that he always insisted on being the last person out of the restaurant. Her dinner with him lasted six hours. He was a jerk in other ways as well. My first reaction was disbelief that someone like him even existed. Another item that surprised me was about a man who would not give any money to his wife but allowed her to purchase as much clothing as she liked. Therefore, she frequently purchased two of each article of clothing and would give the second item to a consignment resale shop.
   
   There is an interview with the author at the end of the audiobook, which does not appear in my paper version of the book. In that interview, the author discusses several topics, one of which follows. I've done some editing for length and clarity.
   
   "When I first started wearing disguises, I thought it was about being anonymous and that it was all about the job, but as time went on I began to see that it's very hard to pretend to be someone and not be that person. People react to what you look like and you yourself begin reacting to how people react to you. I found being in disguise was a way of connecting with myself in a way that I hadn't anticipated. It was also a way of seeing how important (pause). You know, we always say don't judge a book by its cover and it's only the surface, but the truth is that it is more than surface deep. I started thinking how important clothes are and the way that when you're a little girl you make these choices about what you're going to look like and how important it is every time you cut your hair. You're making these decisions and thinking about what it is that people are going to think of you. The surface that we present to the world is very conscious, even when we think its not. We're always thinking about who we are in the world. Our clothing choices and our hair choices and our makeup choices are all saying to the world this is how I want you to see me, and the world really does see you as the way that you present yourself."
   
   Setting: 1990s New York area. Copyright: 2005. Genre: nonfiction, biography, food.



5. I am not a foodie. However, Reichl's writing is so vivid I found myself thinking about the dishes she describes. Her style is easy to follow without dumbing the language down. The novel is one part funny anecdotes, one part food, and one part introspection. A great read!

5 comments about Autobiography ofa Face.

1. I think this is a great book. No wonder it has been adopted by so many high schools. The way Ms.Grealy wrote the book it seems as if you want to be going through the same thing she does. It makes me just want to comfort her because of all the pain and sadness she went through.I think this one of the best books ever written.



2. I liked this book very much, it was hard to read about Lucy. I knew her when she was a beautiful little girl. She would come into the Spring Valley Library with her twin sister. One day I told her she had ink marks on her face and she told me that was for the radiation. She went to school with my kids but they never said anything unkind about her, and years later I saw her on the street, terribly
   deformed on her face. It is a very sad end for a very brave girl who didnt deserve the hand she was dealt. Read the book and rejoice in your better luck.



3. We lost Lucy Grealy too soon. By we, I mean the world of art. She was truly a gifted writer. Her writing slides across the page as if the words are riding sentence surfboards atop waves of emotion. Yeah, I'm pretty corny when it comes to metaphor, but as Lucy might say, "This girl isn't." I wish I could describe how well written this book is, but I've already demonstrated my inability to do it justice. If you haven't read it, you owe it to yourself to meet this incredible little dynamo and see inside someone who held her head and her spirit high enough to challenge us to climb up with her.



4. This book is inspirational and eye-opening. I experienced a different standpoint of truth and beauty. I enjoyed the mechanics and vocabulary in the book. I found the amazing chapter structure easy to use. "Autobiography of a Face" is intelligent and heartfelt . Lucy Grealy surprised me, after reading the afterword by Ann Patchett, when she stated that she was 'making art not a documentary'. I would've look forward to reading Autobiography of a Face: The "Real" Story although I know it would not be written.



5. Grealy was diagnosed with Ewing's Sarcoma at the age of nine. From then on, her life was divided into two parts before and after cancer. After the surgery to remove half her jaw, Grealy spent over two years enduring weekly chemotherapy treatments. When she was finally declared 'healthy', Grealy returned to the sixth grade -- only to be met with scorn and cruelty from her classmates.
   
   Her story is written clearly and concisely. She is unerringly honest about how her disease affected her family, her developing personality, and those around her. As we follow her through years of skin and bone grafts, we witness her need or acceptance from others and her gradual acceptance of herself.
   
   I was particularly struck by Grealy's need to be 'strong.' She is constantly reminded not to cry and to never show fear. This begins Grealy's quest to be the model patient. I am amazed that this small child was able to internalize and minimize her emotions, suffering, and considerable pain. To me, she seemed like an adult soul in a child's body.
   
   I recommend Autobiography of a Face -- it is a moving and meaningful read.

5 comments about Half-Assed: A Weight-Loss Memoir.

1. Fulda lost around 200 pounds and details her weight-loss journey in this book. It's peppered with some facts, along with her slow start (she didn't just get serious and go-go-go) but it took a year to really get losing. She doesn't detail a diet plan but mentions cooking more and making smarter choices and exercising more. This is fine by me because I know how to cook healthier, I know the smarter choices in restaurants and grocery stores and I know I need to exercise. I just need to do these things to succeed. I don't need a plan to follow. She is good at detailing the little day-to-day observations, like buying a top in a size large for the first time in years or huffing and puffing and sweating after walking a few steps or any number of details that plague the life of someone who is too fat or someone who is losing weight. Anyone who has been in either pair of shoes can relate. She's a good writer and it's good food for thought for anybody who wants to lose, who is losing weight or who wants to try and understand a fat person's struggles.



2. I found out about this memoir by accident, and decided to give it a try. It was a great memoir: a story about the real pain experienced by a morbidly obese person (360++ lbs ) before she began her weight loss journey and lost half her body weight. This book is not a story of her self loathing or self pity. It is a straight forward memoir where Jeanette shares her emotions, her successes and some failures along the way. This book is not an instruction manual as to how she lost the weight, but rather it's a very witty book about a mindset and the stick-to- it attitude required for success. Enjoyable.



3. This is an excellent book and the writer is so entertaining, it's like you're sitting down talking with her. For anyone that has a significant amount to lose, this book is inspiring.



4. Jennette Fulda's Half-Assed is not your average weight loss memoir. Not only did Fulda lose over half her body weight, but she does not offer any apologies. In some ways, the book is as much pro-fat as pro-thin. This book, based on her blog Half of Me, chronicles how she got so fat, and, to some extent, what she did to lose the weight. Some of her struggles, such as finding clothes and getting around, are obvious, while others were more hidden, which she explores with humor and wisdom.
   
   Fulda's is an easy read, one that I'm glad I read in part on the treadmill. There is no whining here, even when Fulda presents evidence about why it may be harder for the severely overweight to lose weight. She covers the highs and lows of her journey, as well as the way, as she lost weight, readers and others turned to her for advice as she blogged every step of the way.
   
   Though it seems hard to believe that someone could just happen to wind up weighing 372 pounds, she shows how her lack of education about nutrition spiraled into a weight gain that she didn't truly recognize as a problem, let alone know how to handle, until it had reached such massive proportions. "The fat lost its shock value. It didn't scare me like it scares a skinny girl who's just put on ten pounds and can't fit into her favorite jeans. Ten pounds was a trivially small percentage of my overage." This is but one of the ways that even conceptualizing losing weight was a challenge for Fulda, one she wound up meeting head-on. Both her writing and her weight loss path show a woman with determination, independence, and the ability to sort out what worked for her and what didn't on her own.
   
   Fulda also doesn't give you a saccharine "and now I'm thin and happy" ending. She makes the reader feel the true pain of her weight gain, as well as the not-always-perfect life she leads now. While losing the weight (and blogging about it) drastically changed her life, it was not a panacea, and Fulda doesn't try to spin it that way. She also admits that, yes, there is a chance she might gain weight again, and boldly asserts that being fat is not the worst thing in the world (a fact you might not realize from, well, living in the United States). About her former fat girl life, Fulda writes, "Given the choice between that life and the life of a skinny starlet in rehab, I'd put the fat suit back on fast enough to jam the zipper."
   
   I also must add that this book is published by Seal Press, a feminist press (one I publish with as well), and I think adds a feminist spin to the topic of weight loss. Fulda is not talking about trying to conform to some mediagenic image of perfection, and in fact sounds like she had a pretty good sense of self-esteem when she was overweight (before she got obese), one which aids her as she starts to lose weight. To even have the vision that she could lose half her body weight in a healthy way is a provocative idea at a time when many people simply opt for plastic surgery. She reveals her own issues without pandering to the sexist ideal of ultra-skinnyness at all costs.
   
   My one quibble is that she did not elaborate on the specific diet she chose to use (she has revealed on her blog and in interviews it was the South Beach diet), which made some parts of the book less informed than they could be. Though she explains that this would be like "asking Yo-Yo Ma what kind of cello he played and then expecting to buy one and become a brilliant cellist," I think it could have informed her memoir, but that's a small quibble. Anyone who's ever struggled with their weight, or just wants to read an inspiring story of one woman who forged her way through the world of weight loss, should check out Half-Assed.



5. This is not just another diet book but a book about what really happened during those years of losing weight. I get frustrated with success stories that don't delve into the mind and emotions of the struggle to succeed. Or often times when they try to explain the journey after-the-fact it just comes out sounding so cliche' and empty. Fulda breaks the mold with this book and brilliantly communicates raw and real emotions of the struggles, victories and failures of her phenomenal weight loss achievement. Her commitment is the key to her attitude progression from 'fat girl syndrome' to 'weight loss mentality' to 'athletic decision making'.
   
   There are no secret recipes, instructions or food rules, no exercise plans, etc, etc and thankfully so. If you don't know what to eat or how to exercise by now then you may not be ready for this book because this is where the rubber meets the road. This isn't about how to eat but about how one person got it done and is keeping it done! Not everyone is ready to hear about the struggle when they are still making 'plans' to lose weight but for those of us who are in the trenches this is a MUST READ! This is about a girl who didn't quit - a REAL American hero.
   
   Though thoroughly entertaining this book is not meant for sensitive people. There are times when the language is quite rough and her merciless thoughts about others are a little tough but that's what this book is - her inner thought life. You may even get offended (like you would if you could read the minds of people around you) but I'd encourage you to get over it quickly and read on. I finished this book in 2 days, I don't even know how I found it because I wasn't looking for anything like this on Amazon but it showed up...to use Jeanette's words, my computer must know I'm fat!

5 comments about Princess: A True Story of Life Behind the Veil in Saudi Arabia.

1. The author relates the story of Sultana, a Princess of Saudi Arabia, from childhood to adulthood. We see Sultana's life of unimaginable luxury with palaces, servants, and jewels but, alas, being a female she is a prisoner in her home, subject to the iron will of her father and brother.
   
   This is a good story, but I took it as a fictional story. I never once believed that Sultana was real and that she told these stories. I know the cruelties described in the book exist, but I think "Sultana" is a combination of many nameless Saudi women. Had the author not tried to present this as a memoir but just factually reported the officially-sanctioned abominations that women endure there, I would have liked it better. She tried to manipulate me into feeling pity for the poor little rich girl with tedious and amateurish fiction. None of it rang true.
   
   The author lived in Saudi Arabia for ten years; I would have rather read an account of her experiences than this phony-sounding autobiography. It's right to expose these injustices but the truth is enough; there's no need to embellish it with trumped-up characters.
   
   For a moving and much better-written story of women behind the veil, I recommend A Thousand Splendid Suns.



2. I first read this book when I was 16, and I loved it. It is a work of non-fiction, and based on a true story of a Saudi Arabian princess and her family. She opens up about the injustices the women of Saudi suffer (sexism, FGM, favoritism, not having a say in one's marriage, how society turns a blind eye to abusive husbands, and how she supports a woman's right to freedom.) It is an empowering read, and I enjoyed it thoroughly.
   
   It also has 2 sequels, "Daughters of Arabia" and "Desert Royal" which are equally stirring and totally worth the buy if you like "Princess". The sequels are tough to find at a library, though.



3. I read this book without regard to ethnicity or political belief. I read it as a woman -- as a human being who suffered at the thought of what other women are enduring in the name of "religion" or "culture."
   
   There is no explanation possible to make this palatable to anyone with a conscience. To let it pass without mention is an abomination, akin to denying the Holocaust. There is no justification possible in the eyes of God.
   
   To the perpetrators of this inhumanity to women, I can only promise you that God is watching. Any other comment on these perpetrators is superfluous.



4. I read this when I was high school and was shocked and appalled at how those poor Middle Eastern women live. Now grown, I have Middle Eastern female friends who laugh their head off at this book. Perhaps some of the incidents that are related happened, but I highly doubt they happened to the same person. It's like if someone from Saudi Arabia came here and wrote a book, "Senator's Daughter" or something. The girl was sexually abused starting at age 3, starved by her mother so she wouldn't get fat, pressured into sexually servicing the football team. The father has affairs with both women and men, is a pedophile, and likes to torture cats. The mother is a beaten-down woman who undergoes dozens of plastic surgery procedures and ends up locked in an insane asylum. Have these incidents, separately, happened to American females? Yes. Are they representative of American women, or senator's daughters? Nope. I suspect Jean Sasson did something similar, and it completely destroys any argument she was trying to make! A fun read, but don't take it as gospel.



5. I read Princess the first time many years ago and was very intriged by it. It also made me look into Islam and I can say today I am a Muslim. I read the book again recently and did not find it as good. What must be said is that a lot of horrible things that happened in that book were culture and *not* Islam. (I will also say that Saudi is not a good example of a Islamic country.)
   
   Other than that issue I think it's a good read. Just don't read too much into it. If you really want to get a look into life in Saudi there are Saudi feminist bloggers on the net. That would give you a better view than this book.

5 comments about A Midwife's Tale: The Life of Martha Ballard, Based on Her Diary, 1785-1812.

1. I greatly enjoyed this book, which gave a truly unique and rare perspective into female life in early Colonial New England. Thoroughly absorbing the chapters is truly co-dependent on simultaneously reading through the footnotes at the back, so know in advance that there will be a lot of flipping back and forth, but that this will enrich and enhance the interpretation and absorbability of the diary. I love firsthand historical accounts, and now have a renewed appreciation for early colonial life, particularly that of the female voice in this era, and even moreso women in childbirth in rural Maine in the winter (!). It almost seems voyeuristic to read Martha's diary, knowing that she likely never intended for it to be read by anyone else, let alone 220+ years later, but her voice is fluid, peaceful, humble, and dutiful to her family and her society. If you enjoyed this, also rent or buy the PBS documentary video of it by the same name, which has period re-enactments, and live narration by the author as she explains the journey of putting this work together. A fabulous read, ripe for discussion particularly in examining the parallels between this life so long ago, and our own today.



2. Laurel Thatcher Ulrich's A Midwifes' Tale: The Life of Martha Ballard, Based on Her Diary, 1785-1812 demonstrates that an ordinary person's life can shed light and produce a more rich historiographical picture of a time period than solely focusing on prominent figures and events of history. The main thrust of this work is to debunk previous opinions of the diary that found the work not very useful in presenting important matters of historical interest of colonial times such as historian James W. North's comment "brief and with some exceptions not of general interest" or Charles Elventon Nash's comment ""trivial and unimportant...being but a repetition of what has been recited many times" and concluded "Like many diaries of farm women, it is filled with trivia about domestic chores and pastimes." (pp. 8,9) Ulrich debunks these previous interpretations of Martha Ballard's diary by showing that the diary exposes the social history of not only women in rural colonial times but addresses the bigger picture of colonial life in general through the daily activities of herself, her family, and neighbors in the community. Ulrich compares Martha Ballard's diary with three other documents from the community and time period Martha Ballard lived in. These documents were specifically from Daniel Cony who was a medical doctor, William Howard a wealthy businessman, and Henry Sewall who was the town clerk. She uses these documents to fill in information not mentioned in Martha Ballard's diary and also as a counterbalance of the men's perspective of events in Hallowell and what they felt was important to document verses a women's perspective of what Martha Ballard thought was worth documenting in her diary. Ulrich then extrapolates from these sources an interpretive picture of colonial life. On the one hand the heavy interpretive nature of this book forces the reader to wonder if this interpretation is close to the mark of accuracy or flawed in someway. On the other hand Ulrich heavily used other documented evidence to support her interpretation which lends credibility to her interpretation. An amateur historian would have a difficult time painting this picture of colonial life; however, Ulrich seems to do this with great expertise and eloquence. The expertise and eloquence is obviously derived from her academic career which has focused on the social history of women during the United States colonial era.
   
   Laurel Thatcher Ulrich's academic life has consisted of previously being a professor of American history at the University of New Hampshire and is currently a Phillips Professor of Early American history at Harvard University. Ulrich's main research area has been in the fields of early American social history, women's history, and material culture. Some of Ulrich's work in this area include Good Wives: Image and Reality in the Lives of Women in Early New England, 1650-1750 (1982), A Midwife's Tale: The Life of Martha Ballard Based on Her Diary, 1785-1812 (1990), In The Age of Homespun: Objects and Stories in the Making of an American Myth (2001), and Well-behaved Women Seldom Make History (2007). Ulrich certainly has over twenty years of research in the area of social history in the colonial era to make her an authoritative author on the subject and this is demonstrated in her work A Midwife's Tale in which she not only used evidence from documents from that particular community in the time period, but also used her historical imagination, (sometimes used to heavily), to interpret the diary entries to give a vivid depiction of both Martha Ballard's life and colonial rural life in general.
   
   Ulrich formatted each chapter by presenting excerpts from Martha Ballard's diary and then spent the remainder of each chapter comparing these entries with the other written accounts from that time and using an interpretive approach to decipher what the significance of Martha Ballard's entries meant with regards to the life of Martha Ballard and the community she lived in. Ulrich didn't include the entire diary of Martha Ballard in her book and selectively pulled excerpts from different parts to illustrate the different social factors playing out in the daily life of Martha and the Hallowell community, but did include other entries from the dairy within her evaluation to support her interpretation. Obviously Ulrich could not have included all the entries of Martha Ballard's diary and analyzed all sections due to the constraints a book length imposes, however, some interpretations were based on an entire reading of the diary and the reader is not privy to this broader context of information. Ulrich acknowledges this fact when she stated, "Someday the dairy may be published. What follows in no sense is a substitute for it; it is an interpretation, a kind of exegesis." (p. 34) Ulrich admittedly states this is only an interpretation in which Ulrich seems to read in between the lines and/or provides an interpretation based on what was not said verses what was explicitly said due to the fact the entries were brief, mostly lacked an opinionated tone, and were mostly matter of fact daily details. Even though the other sources of evidence backing her interpretations were thorough there is no true way to know if Ulrich's interpretations are mostly correct, somewhat correct, or completely flawed unless the reader had read the entire dairy and other documents she consulted herself. This leaves the reader to just take Ulrich's word for it that her interpretation of the diary entries are as accurate as they can be. Ulrich in some cases may have used her historical imagination a bit excessively, but overall she presents enough evidence from other sources to make her interpretation for the most part as credible as it can be and never the less very enjoyable to read.



3. Please disregard the 2 stars in the rating. It is a 5 star book. The system automaticaly put 2 stars and would not let me change it.
   
   I can't say enough about how wonderful this book is and how much I enjoyed reading it. This book would be a wonderful gift for anyone in the medical profession. It is a fascinating account of an amazing woman facing the challenges of life in early Maine as well as the every day facts of life necessary for survival. She contributed immensely to life itself as she was the midwife to hundreds of, if not more, women and the birth of their children.
   
   For myself, I used it as a genealogical tool because that is the area of the country where all of my ancestors came from. It is facinating to know the trials and tribulations as well as the joys of our ancestors.
   
   Priscilla Paul
   Memphis



4. I know this is a well respected book but in all honesty I found it to be very repetitious and boring. There are only so many times you can listen to complaints about colic and very similar sounding births before you get bored to tears. While writing the history of ordinary people is important, Ballard lived a boring and uneventful life. Unless you want to hear about the stories of dozens of births steer clear. And i'm a phd student used to dry books.



5. Interesting diary of a Maine midwife. Not the easiest read but enjoyable.

5 comments about Brilliant Madness: Living with Manic Depressive Illness.

1. Anna ( Patty Duke), is a great lady! This book, An excellent and sad look at what a bipolar person goes through with and without help, I*m so happy that there is a name and treatment for this very sad illness. Anna tells it like it is and does it with class! May God Bless Anna Duke!



2. Can someone please give this book to Britney Spears? I'm not joking. I first read this book about 9 years ago when I was studying psychology in college and it was always one of my very favorite books on this subject. Because Ms. Duke is able to speak to the reader in such simple (yet interesting) words. Except for the old-fashioned term "manic depressive illness" (according to the APA, the correct term is bipolar, which sounds way more PC) this book is totally on the money. Another great book I recommend is Undercurrents: A Life Beneath the Surface. In 2008 it seems rather common for celebrities to discuss their dementia, and anything else that the public wants to know. So it may seem hard to fathom that less than thirty years ago none of this was discussed publicly because it was considered "career suicide." But Patty Duke was the very first star who candidly discussed her own mental illness in her autobiography . In my eyes, she is a true shero.



3. Celebrities who come out about a physical or mental illness help us get past shame, but Patty Duke does a lot more in this autobiography where she alternates her memories with professionally written chapters about bipolar illness. As a mental health advocate, I recommend this book especially to give to people with the illness who aren't ready for technical or self-help books.



4. If you want to know some of the unbelieveable, unbearable pain and suffering of an un-treated manic-depressive, read this book. How Patty Duke lived to tell her story is a miracle. Thank God she finally found her way out of her madness She gives hope to her fellow sufferers. From the perspective of gut-wrenching pain just reading her account, the book works wonderfully. But as a narrative, I found it hard to follow. I felt jerked around from eposide to eposide. There didn't seem to be a timeline I could follow to know what happened, when. Also, it was very distracting to have to plow through the pages of medical, technical information that were dispersed throughout the book. Overall, it's a fine description of the illness, but frustrating to read.



5. I just finished this book, and I thought it was very readable and an excellent memoir describing issues related to bipolar. The honesty with which the book is written is commendable. I highly recommend it for anyone wishing to learn more about this disorder and how helpful appropriate treatment can be.

5 comments about Gertrude Bell: Queen of the Desert, Shaper of Nations.

1. Much has been said about the book's contents in previous reviews. What I would like to add is that the author did a masterful job with bringing history so alive. The historical facts were well researched before the book was written. Instead of presenting them in a rather factual manner Georgina Howell converted them in a gripping story which makes it hard to put the book aside. She stays humble in the back and let the protangonists speak for themselves. When reading books of popular history one often gets the impression that writers project their personalities into the stories. This is absolutely not the case with this book, except perhaps with respect to the author's interest for clothing matters which is not distracting however. The relations between Gertrude Bell and her environments are so well described that one gets literally the feeling to become part of them. This only happens with extraordinary books to which this one certainly belongs.
   
   I got interested in this book through a similar well written book by Ronald Florence on the relation between Aaron Aarohnsohn and T.E. Lawrence. Reading both books gives a good impression of the Arabist and Zionist views after the fall of the Ottoman empire. Both also demystify the role of T.E. Lawrence in shapening the Middle-East whose epic book "Seven pillars of wisdom" I find a rather boring read.



2. One measure of a fine book is if it captures and holds the reader's attention even if the subject is outside the reader's background and interests. This is such a book. Gertrude Bell (1868-1926)led an extraordinary life, whose many facets are captured in this superior biography. Born to a wealthy Yorkshire family, she was the first woman to receive a First Class degree in modern history from Oxford. She next took up challenging mountain climbing (my only criticism of the book is too much space is devoted to this topic). But the book's core is the period when she becomes interested in the Middle East, which the British designated as Mesopotamia and TransJordan, but which we know today as Iraq and Saudi Arabia.
   
   She mastered the pertinent languages (Turkish and of course Arabic among others), traveled all over the region between 1900 and 1914 conducting archeology research and photographing sites (many of which photos are available on the web in the Gertrude Bell Photographic Archive of Newcastle University), authored a number of books, and became well acquainted with the Bedouin tribes that roamed the area. Later she joined the British colonial administration in Baghdad, and helped (along with her friend T.E. Lawrence) foment the Arab uprising against the Turks during WWI that is the central element of the "Lawrence of Arabia" film. She argued for self-determination for this area at the Versailles Peace Conference, and even confronted Churchill on the issue when he had responsibility for colonial administration. She helped map the boundaries of what we now know as Iraq, was instrumental in selecting Faisal as its first King, and played a prominent role in the governance of the new nation. As if this was not enough, toward the end of her life (she committed suicide in 1926, probably due to advanced lung cancer) she founded the National Museum of Iraq, the same museum that the American military allowed to be ransacked during the Iraq War. She is buried in Baghdad.
   
   The book is over 400 pages in this paperback edition, but it moves along quickly as it is quite a fascinating tale. The author has included extensive notes, some excellent Bell photographs, a chronology, and a fine bibliography. A major side benefit to reading the book is that the reader learns quite a lot about the background of Iraq and Saudi Arabia, obviously topics greatly on our minds at the present. To have led such a life is amazing; to have contributed in so many ways during that life is even more so. The book Ms. Bell deserved.



3. The author gives absolutely no insight into Gertrude Bell and just recites the itinerary of one trip after another. Bell is made out to be an obsessive cartoon character running around the map like Bugs Bunny. After climbing the Matterhorn, she mysteriously decides to expensively explore the desert -- alone. I'd really like to know more about her. Someone suggested Desert Queen" by Janet Wallach.



4. I have come to enjoy memoir because it is full of feeling as well as information. But Georgina Howell's biography is so full of excerpts from the letters of Gertrude Bell--the subject of this excellent book--that we get a comprehensive sense of Bell's feelings. Howell makes it clear that Bell consistently understated the difficulties in her life. It is certainly a life to know about and to be celebrated.
   
   Gertrude Bell, who died in 1926, is known as the woman behind the creation of modern Iraq. She was born into a wealthy socially conservative family and displayed her brilliance and non-conformity early on. She attended Oxford and was the first woman to attain First Class Honors in History. She traveled to Persia, began her studies of Persian language and literature in Teheran, and fell in love with a man unacceptable to her family. She returned to England, where she continued her studies, adding Arabic to the mix. Never one to live life half way, she discovered the challenge of mountain climbing and conquered several peaks in the Alps, sometimes being the first woman to do so.
   
   Bell made three trips through the uncharted Arabian Peninsula, visiting archeological sites, carefully creating maps, and dropping in to visit sheiks in full evening wear. An important purpose of her travels was to learn about the alliances and customs of the numerous tribes. This knowledge was applied when she began working with the British government to build a unified Arabic nation after the defeat of the Germans and their allies the Turks in WWI.
   
   The unification was a struggle. Howell writes: "The army wins the territory, and the administration takes over; but in Mesopotamia the struggle to install conditions conducive to peace and eventual prosperity would prove as daunting as the battlefront itself...Arabs spoke a common language but were not a common people..." This struggle, which took place almost 100 years ago, has many similarities with the Iraq struggle today. Bell's later life was so intertwined with the founding of Iraq that the details of the political struggle cannot be left out.
   
   Howell does a splendid job of bringing the astonishing Gertrude Bell to life. Her descriptions of the often bleak landscape, the oases of sheikdoms, and the contrast of desert life with Bell's luxurious wardrobe, living style and traveling entourage enliven the biography. Fortunately for us, Bell's family and friends saved her detailed letters. Gertrude Bell: Queen of the Desert, Shaper of Nations illuminates the many centuries-old causes of the current struggle in the Middle East.
   
   by Judith Helburn
   for Story Circle Book Reviews
   reviewing books by, for, and about women



5. Well written---engaging story. Historically comprehensive. Provides valuable insight into historical background of current Iraq conflict.

5 comments about Take This Bread: A Radical Conversion.

1. This book was SO good. It is one of the best queer spiritual journeys I've ever read. Sara Miles is unpretentious and honest, and I think she captures the spiritual dilemmas that so many of us face right now.
   If you are struggling with your spiritual journey and chafe against old names and categories, this book will change your life. I think it's going to be a very influential text.
   Oh, and it's a fabulous read! I couldn't put it down.



2. I love reading about converts to the Episcopal Church, I am one myself. The more unusual the story, the more it interests me and Miles' story fits that bill. Although I found some things about her puzzling- for instance: she calls herself "lesbian" but has an affair with a man (Huh?!) and then she seems to think that getting pregnant in the middle of a war was a good idea (What?!), I thought her life was fascinating. She is also admirable for starting the food pantry, and for linking food to ministry and to communion- the Body of Christ. The analogy is excellent. It also shows how a church can be so open and welcoming to all people from all walks of life, and although not intended as an ad for the Episcopal Church, it sure serves as great publicity!



3. Take This Bread: A Radical ConversionThis book is a must read for anyone interested in understanding the community of food! Sara Miles is a writer and was an athiest who came to understand the role of sharing a meal in building community. After a varied career of cooking in restaurant kitchens and serving as an activist in poverty stricken and war torn countries, she comes home to a radical conversion resulting from the simple words: "Take this bread" said to her at a service of Holy Communion. Her conversion leads to growth in understaning the community that God intends for all humankind. Along the way, she is drawn into the community with afforded by a food pantry program she starts at her newly found church community.
   
   Its all about the human hunger for belonging and for the meaning that comes from sharing food!
   
   A wonderful book and a quick read!



4. Sara Miles' book "Take This Bread" is a perfect read for our times. Her realization that feeding others is an ultimate act of goodness came during a worship service. But the real story is what she did next. She went out from that church and created a feeding program when others said it couldn't be done. Then she helped others create feeding programs. I have recommended the book to people of different faiths and political views. They all love it. And even more, they have been inspired to get involved in helping the hungry. The new paperback version contains a Readers' Guide - perfect for book groups.



5. take this bread is one of the best left-of-center spiritual memoirs i've read, ever.
   
   sara miles is a self-described liberal, an intellectual journalist who spent much of her life covering wars from the side of the oppressed (often in stark contrast to u.s. policy). she grew up in a staunchly athiest home (though both of her parents were children of missionaries, which ends up playing into her story in surprising and deeply satisfying ways), and was, as she says, the last person her friends would have expected to start talking about jesus.
   
   sara walked into a san francisco church one day -- called, one might way; compelled, she wasn't sure why -- and took the eucharist. and something clicked, in that moment. she had an encounter with jesus that she was never able to dismiss or shake off. eventually, her connection with jesus became a compelling call to feed others, as she was fed. sara started a food pantry, literally ON the alter of her extremely nervous church. the book walks through her multiple conversions, and those of the people around her, many of them already professed christians.
   
   the comparisons to anne lamott are easy (especially to anne's first spiritual memoir, traveling mercies). both are brilliant with words; both are liberals from san francisco, who grew up in book-loving, athiest, intellectual homes; both are liberal in every sense of the word; and both are deeply in love with jesus and passionate about following his lead. this -- i think -- is what seperates both anne and sara from classical liberals, who spent a good deal of their time distancing themselves from jesus.
   
   but sara miles and anne lammott are not the same. sara doesn't have annie's wit, which, while i absolutely adore annie's wit, makes this book somewhat more compelling, and a bit less like a collection of witty, liberal, jesus-y essays. if annie's "theme" is her self-loathing and insecurity, sara's strong-willed theme is: food. food weaves its way through every chapter of the book: from her childhood, to her experiences as a chef in new york, to her connections with people in the third world, to her intitial and ongoing experience with jesus, to her establishment of one, then many, food pantries. it's hard not to read this book and not simultaneously hanker for a chunk of some cheese you can't pronounce, and want to give that cheese to someone who wouldn't otherwise experience their next meal.
   
   wonderful, wonderful reading. challenging at points. highly edible. deeply nourishing.