Country People by Daniel Mason

Country People by Daniel Mason, 320 pages.

A married couple of English professors and their children move to rural Vermont, where they encounter local semi-supernatural phenomena that mirror the folklore that our main character studies. Along the way, we enjoy the quirks of the titular country people, as well as the academic people and the married and parenting people.

I don’t want to say much more lest I spoil it, but I really liked this one! It was funny and sweet and celebrated weirdness in a way that I really dug. If you liked Welcome to Nightvale, the Netflix series The Chair, or the novels of Taffy Brodesser-Akner (though this is considerably lighter) you’d probably like County People.

The Last Report on the Miracles at Little No Horse by Louise Erdrich, 368 pages

The Last Report on the Miracles at Little No Horse by Louise Erdrich, 368 pages

It is very difficult to summarize this book! I’ll give it a shot: An eccentric, musically genius ex-nun is widowed and impersonates a priest in the Minnesotan wilderness for much of their life, becoming ingrained in the local Native American community. The tone is somewhere between historical/ (mostly) realistic fiction and Capital L Literature.

This book has all of the things that a Louise Erdrich fan is looking for: A terribly interesting and admirable protagonist, Native American culture and community, love stories that are interesting and surprising...and yet never the focal point of the story.

It would also be difficult to overstate how much I loved LROTMALNH! In addition to the point of view of the protagonist (who goes by a few different names), we see how community changes over a long period of time, and have a variety of interesting religious experiences represented, and explores complicated spirituality sincerely. While there are themes of mysticism and ethical dilemma, I would never classify this as “Christian Fiction” to someone looking for that genre. It was impressive to cover such a length of time- 70ish years- in less than 400 pages without ever feeling that the story glossed over anything. Very engrossing, too! I recommend this one if, like me, you found The Sentence to be “just okay” but want to try more Louise.

Native Stranger: A Black American's Journey into the Heart of Africa

Native Stranger: A Black American's Journey into the Heart of Africa Eddy L. Harris 315 pages

This is a travelogue by St. Louisan Eddy Harris, better known for Mississippi Solo, about his journey through an impressive portion of Africa. It was published in 1992, so it’s also a bit of a portrait of an Africa in which globalization wasn’t quite so pronounced.

My high school French teacher gifted me a copy of this book when I was about 16, and I remembered liking it but was curious to see how much of it had really stuck with me.

Harris is so charming and honest, I found the book funny and touching and human. I hadn’t retained much over the years, so it was rare treat to read a book for the first time, twice. Some parts are difficult, about poverty and disease. There is a lot of bodily function talk, but the author’s purpose is to face his discomfort head-on. His honesty about how the intention to not behave “Americanly” when travelling, and how that intention can erode when we’re exhausted and uncomfortable was interesting, and is not often explored in travel writing. I did roll my eyes a little at author’s preoccupation with cultural differences female modesty, but I suspect that the author, like me, would see this journey through a different lens today.

I recommend this one even if you don’t normally gravitate toward travel writing. I have written in this blog before that this genre is saturated with pretty bad writing, and now I wonder if I feel that way because this one spoiled me for the average travelogue 25 years ago.

Turning to Stone: Discovering the Subtle Wisdom of Rocks

Turning to Stone: Discovering the Subtle Wisdom of Rocks Marcia Bjornerud 288 pages

Our author tells stories from her life and career, relating them to little lessons in geology. This blends a lot of subgenres that I adore, including:

*Memoirs that are anecdotes from an interesting job
*Teacher stories
*Nonfiction in which authors look at a subject and say “We are not so different, you and I.”

This was really fun, as our author is very likable and imparts some interesting information about rocks and how the field of geology has changed over the last 50 years or so. The parts about working in really remote places and the camaraderie between the scientists were especially fun. I recommend to anyone casually interested in science.

Hearts of Oak by Eddie Robson

 

I do not know how I feel about this book! I have 15 different opinions. It's a dimestore Piranesi, but also Westworld-meets-Truman Show- meets Alien. But the style is much like Star Trek: The Original Series.  Our story takes place in a walled kingdom made entirely of wood. A king lives in a tower, out of touch with his people, his only advisor a talking cat. Below, an architecture professor meets a mysterious woman that triggers realizations about life beyond the walls. Of course, the two stories eventually converge.  I seemed to go through a cycle of different reactions, including "huh?" "Okay, I think I see" and "meh?".  On the one hand, I appreciated that I had no idea where the author was taking me. On the other hand, a lot of problems were solved with a hand-wave and it lacked the sort of texture that immerses you in a sci-fi or fantasy story. I don't read much of this sort of thing, but it was definitely interesting.

Tracks by Robin Davidson

 

Tracks by Robin Davidson, 288 pages

Tracks is a pretty standard travel book originally published in 1995. The author, an Australian woman, moves to Alice Springs and learns to handle camels. She then walks across the Western Australian wilderness with four camels and a dog.  I found the book to be pretty good, but I like a story about a solo trip even if it's a little predictable. Of course the people that solo trekkers meet along the way are some of the most interesting parts of the story.  Some aspects of animal husbandry seem harsh to those of us who are not farmers. So reader discretion is advised on that topic.

The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating by Elizabeth Tova Bailey, 190 pages

 

This is one of those memoirs that isn’t strictly a memoir, and contains just interesting things that the writer has found out researching a topic. In this case, the story vacillates between the author’s own experience with a chronic illness and her relationship with a snail that a friend brings her for company, and interesting snail facts about snails in nature and pop culture. Kind of a subgenre that could be called “We’re Not So Different, You and I”. This as a pretty good quick little read. No real complaints about it, but nothing earthshattering. Alternate title could easily be Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Snail Sex but Were Afraid to Ask.

Automatic Noodle by Annalee Newitz, 163 pages

Others on our blog have summarized this one very well, so I’ll skip that part. I had tried the audiobook of this one a while back, but found that it required more attention than I was willing to give in that moment. Inspired by the reviews of my coworkers, I gave it another shot and am glad I did. It’s hard to find something that finds the sweet spot of wholesome but not saccharine, and I think this did that very well. The pacing of revealing with the world in the story was excellent, but I’m not sure that there was a whole lot going for it after that. The approach to social issues that it touched on seemed a little on-the-nose...but overall it was a very fun quick read.