Dude: The Big Book of Zonker

 

Dude: The Big Book of Zonker by G.B. Trudeau  284 pp.

Zonker Harris has been a pivotal character in the Doonesbury comic strip for 50+ years. This collection of strips featuring the beloved Zonker covers his time at Walden College and living in the Walden Commune with the other characters through to his time serving as a nanny for his college football captain, B.D. and his wife, Boopsie, and daughter, Sam. The strips follow Zonker's career gaining national acclaim as a  professional sun tanner, as the Lt. Governor of Haiti, joining the British aristocracy, periodic returns home to his parents, helping to provide medical marijuana to cancer and AIDS patients, becoming a nanny for first for former roommates Mike and J.J. and then for B.D. This collection ends when B.D. loses a leg in combat and the story of B.D. continues in further volumes. In spite of the drug using, anti-establishment antics of Zonker, the comic strip contains much social/political commentary of the years of it's publication. In spite of much that is ridiculous, like surfing with a small baby, Zonker is a loveable dude and provides a kind of social conscience no matter how quirky.

Cadillac Beach

 Cadillac Beach by Tim Dorsey  339 pp.

I enjoy Carl Hiaasen's novels about Florida mayhem, especially the ones that include the former governor known as "Skink". I was expecting something in a similar vein in this book featuring Dorsey's main character Serge Storms. Yes, there are similarities but Serge Storms is "over the top" in his actions/reactions. Serge is off his meds and joins with his substance abusing friend, Lenny in the search for the truth about his grandfather Sergio's death and the missing jewels that were stolen in the early 1960s. They set up a phony tour company and kidnap some sports fans/customers for a wild romp through Miami. Flashbacks to the time period of the theft and Sergio's disappearance flesh out the story. The involvement of the Mob, the CIA, FBI, and the militant Cubans makes the story very convoluted. The body count is excessive. In spite of it all the ending is somewhat happy. 

Love, Chai, and Other Four-Letter Words

 

Love, Chai, and Other Four-Letter Words by Annika Sharma (2021) 374 pages

Kiran is a 28-year-old biomedical engineer based in New York City and is supporting her parents, who live in India. She's a dutiful daughter, knowing how important it is to take care of them, especially since they had sent away her older sister after she married a lower-caste Indian 20 years ago. Kiran's trying to find a suitable Indian spouse, but like her tightly-knit group of four friends from college, she has had no luck.

Meanwhile, Nash has just moved to New York City from Tennessee. He's had a tough childhood, with his drug-using mother and absentee father. With the support of his aunt and his best friend's family, he's now a psychologist, ready to start working in a hospital in New York.

When Kiran and Nash meet, it's an instant friendship. But can the relationship go anywhere further with Kiran's wish to please her parents and with Nash's reticence to trusting in a relationship? The twists and turns kept this situation from being too formulaic of a love story. Just enough to give a pleasant day's reading.

Things To Do When You're Goth in the Country

Things To Do When You're Goth in the Country by Chavisa Woods (2017) 221 pages

This book is comprised of eight thought-provoking short stories that often center on young gay and transsexual persons, usually in a rural setting. One, called A New Mohawk, is told by a transman who has discovered that his mohawk has become a miniature replica of a wall between Israel and Palestine. He can hear the rockets going between the territories, and whenever a person is mortally wounded by the fighting, the tiny being falls off his head onto the floor and dies. Heady stuff, indeed. Some other stories have similar kinds of magical happenings. In others, drugs might fuel the weirdness.

Rule of the Bone

Rule of the Bone, Russell Banks, 390 pages

I originally read Russell Banks's Rule of the Bone in high school, and at the time thought the protagonist Chapman, AKA The Bone, was underwhelming and I did not understand why he seemed so blank at the start of the book. Rereading it now, fifteen years and a lot of life experience later, I can understand the "blank" qualities he exhibited, that he just seemed to follow along with the events that were occurring around, and how he never really seemed to understand right from wrong. His lack of world and life experiences that are positive contrast strongly with what he feels should be right, and that is a lot of where his internal conflicts come from. He goes from homeless, drug addled teen and criminal, to a young man who finally understands that life outlooks come from role models and experiences, and even negative experiences can create positive changes in one's life. His sometimes rambling and unreliable nature as a narrator are showcased in the way that Banks writes, in train of thought sentences that expand and contract based upon the actions of Chappie. While an enjoyable read, some of the topics Banks hits upon (child abuse, drug abuse, murder) may be a bit much for some readers.

The Best Kind of People

The Best Kind of People by Zoe Whittall, 430 pages

When a high school teacher is arrested, accused by four students of sexual misconduct on a class ski trip, his life and the lives of his family are turned completely upside down. The author transports the reader delicately into the evolving points of view of  his wife, adult son, and high school-aged daughter. We see how the crisis changes relationships within and outside the family. Like his family, I kept wondering whether to believe the man or his accusers. Whittall's novel, published in 2016, evokes the #MeToo movement that has lately resonated through our society.