The Night Gardener

The Night Gardener by Jonathan Auxier  350 pp.

This was another one of my Treehouse Book Club books. The story is a creepy but intriguing tale about storytelling and greed. Irish orphans, Molly and Kip, have landed in England in search of work. Molly is a storyteller and uses her stories to comfort her younger brother's fears. Molly is hired to be a servant to the Windsor family but everyone they meet on the way cautions them not to go there because the manor house in the "sourwoods" is evil. The house is built with a large tree engulfing it inside and out. The tree is the source of the evil and the family is suffering the effects of the tree's magic. The appearance of the "Night Gardener" is just one facet of the strange goings-on. Auxier has produced a story that has potential to become a classic.  His masterful use of descriptive language makes this book something special. One of the book club kids declared it was one of the best books she ever read.

What happened

What happened / Hillary Rodham Clinton, 494 pages.

Talking to a friend, we decided that if Hillary would have won we now would be complaining about how she was disappointing us, how she wasn't getting enough done, how we wanted MORE. But we wouldn't be afraid of a nuclear war, horrified at degradation of American world influence and lack of leadership.  Here Clinton is brutally honest and open about mistakes she made, mistakes others made and how things ended up so poorly.  I don't know how else to say it, but there is a lot of pain and suffering yet Clinton is still gracious and appreciative of those who support her.  I'm not sure why I chose to read this book now, it seems too soon, but I'm glad I did and would recommend it to anyone interested in politics, women leaders or tragic endings.

All grown up

All grown up / Jami Attenberg, 197 pages.

Andrea really starts out grown up but then continues to grow.  She is an art school grad but ends up in the grind of advertising, easily doing well in a job she does not enjoy.  She spends her time partying, screwing guys she dates and avoiding the "expected" path. She has no desire to pair off or have kids.  She kind of ignores her family and the fact that she is in a rut.  Her friends are out there getting married, having kids, getting divorced and she is avoiding all of those things.  I can get behind that but in the end, she just seems bored.  This book has gotten some great reviews, maybe I just didn't get it.  I don't regret reading it but not sure who I would recommend it to.

Believe me

Believe me: a memoir of love, death and jazz chickens / Eddie Izzard, read by the author, 348 pgs.

Izzard's memoir is chatty and informative.  There is a lot of focus on his childhood and the trauma of his mother's death when Izzard was six years old.  After that, he and his brother went to boarding school so everything changed radically for him.  His dad was still around and a loving guy but boarding school reshaped his life.  The story picks up when he gets to performing in college.  I can appreciate hearing about learning to perform on the street, on the stage and then on TV and film.  Izzard realization that he is trans and how he dealt with it are also highlights. His charity runs are not featured enough, in my opinion.  In the end, this is probably best for people who are fans or interested in Izzard.  The audio book is well done and contains lots of extra features and comments.

Ants among elephants

Ants among elephants: an untouchable family and the making of modern India / Sujatha Gidla, 306 pages.

An interesting family history that reveals some about the modern India and the caste system.  This book focuses mostly on the lives of the author's mother and her uncles.  It starts with her collecting the family stories and adding to her own history.  She is trying to beat the clock, her elderly relatives are dying off.  One uncle was a revolutionary poet and communist.  He lead some resistance activities but never mastered caring for himself.  His followers, siblings, then wife had to shave him and help him put on his clothes. He devotes his life to the cause and influences his family to do so as well.  In between, daily life happens, people work, marry, fight and reconcile.  Kids are born and jobs are done. I found this to be a remarkable book and about a time and place that is foreign to me.

Modern Retro Home

Modern Retro Home by Mr. Jason Grant, photography by Lauren Bamford, 255 pages

Interior decorator Jason Grant (who includes the "Mr." on the cover, title page, and "about the author" page) presents a coffee-table book filled with rooms decorated with plenty of mid-century flair. Each page offers Grant's takeaways on the room presented, though after a while I found these one- to two-sentence opinions more annoying than enlightening. What shines in this book is Bamford's beautiful photography and the rooms, which Grant explains are the homes of his creative friends. (That said, I know some staging was going on, if only because there is no way someone would decorate a kid's room with a cactus and an antique horse toy instead of stuffed animals.) I found plenty of inspiration for my own mid-century home, though I hope you'll forgive me for my assumption that macrame = cat toy.

House Witness

House Witness by Mike Lawson, 353 pages.
In his twelfth Joe Demarco thriller, Lawson has regained his old form. All of the stories are good, but some of them are merely good. This one is fast-paced and lean. DeMarco, semi-attorney, sometimes investigator, occasional-bagman, and full-time fixer is sent off to Manhattan by his boss, Minority Leader of the House, John Mahoney, to make sure that the murderer of one Dominic DiNunzio is found guilty and sent to prison. Joe is only told that his boss is interested because the dead man's mother is an old friend of the Congressman. When the slam dunk murder case against alleged killer Toby Rosenthal starts falling apart, DeMarco has to figure out the why, and the who in a short period of time. DeMarco, the DA assigned to the case, and an unpaid intern race the clock trying to find a shadowy jury specialist who help the ultra-rich evade justice. Lawson, who always writes a good story, trims down the narrative and barely mentions many of his regular characters and that helps keep this tale taut and focused. The villains are drawn well and are interesting characters in their own right, especially Ella, who is not super evil, just competent and determined and maybe a bit of a sociopath. She has a life plan and needs to get on with things. Joe doesn't find any life affirming answers, doesn't find any clues about his past, and doesn't find a new love. He gets lucky and solves the case.

My Favorite Thing Is Monsters

My Favorite Thing Is Monsters: Book One, by Emil Ferris, 386 pages.

Karen, the young woman telling the story of this graphic novel, sees herself as a young werewolf. More than that, she sees herself as a werewolf private detective. Karen lives with her mother and her older brother Deeze in Chicago in the late 1960s. There is a lot of family drama going on, and though Deeze and mom do their best to keep Karen in the dark, she is determined to find out their secrets. There is a lot of drama in her downtown neighborhood, too. One of their neighbors goes missing (leaving behind his ventriloquist dummy), another is sent off to prison, and most mysteriously, the beautiful and secretive neighbor upstairs apparently shot herself in the living room of her locked apartment and then went to bed and tucked herself in before dying.
There are some horrifying scenes here, Karen is threatened with violence and finds out terrible and disturbing things about what has been done to her neighbors, and about what they have done. She's courageous, and relentless, even though she knows now that not everything is going to work out okay in the end. Great art and strong storytelling.

Once in a Blue Moon Lodge

Once in a Blue Moon Lodge by Lorna Landvik (2017), 317 pages

In this book, author Lorna Landvik picks up the story from one of her previous novels, Patty Jane's House of Curl (1995). If you haven't read Patty Jane (or like me, forgot some details over time), no fear; Landvik catches us up seamlessly. The primary focus is on Nora, a single attorney returned home to Minnesota from a stint in LA. Feeling uncertain what to do with her life, several events occur which set its course: She has a chance encounter with a French-speaking Canadian at a campsite, she gives a ride to a snarly old widow who owns a large lodge, and she accompanies her grandmother Ione to Norway. While in Norway, Nora learns that the old widow in Minnesota wants to sell her lodge to Nora at a great discount. Also in Norway, Nora meets a doctor, who is everything that she could want in a permanent relationship. However, Nora discovers she is pregnant as a result of the encounter with the Canadian, with triplets, no less! The story is loaded with other believable--and mostly lovable--protagonists (including Nora's mother, Patty Jane) and we experience their stories as well. If one could choose one's own family, this would be the one!

Downsizing the Family Home: What to Save, What to Let Go

Downsizing the Family Home: What to Save, What to Let Go by Marni Jameson, 237 pages (2015)

Marni Jameson writes from two sets of personal experiences: clearing out and selling her parents' home after they moved into an assisted living community, plus downsizing her own possessions after her divorce.  Jameson picks the brains of experts in the field, providing helpful information on handling what to keep, what to sell and how (auction versus estate and yard sales) and what to give away (and where).  Once the home is emptied, we also learn some tips on how to maximize profits by carefully choosing what to spend money on to prepare the house for the market.

This practical guide taught me that I should periodically weed through my own things, and probably try to get my older relatives to do so too.  Most importantly, Jameson's experts stress that our things (and the things of those we love) do not define us.