The noble hustle

The noble hustle: poker, beef jerky and death by Colson Whitehead 234 pgs.

I picked up this book after reading "American Housewife" and learning that author Helen Ellis coached Colson Whitehead on his epic poker journey to the World Series of Poker.  I had read only one other book by Whitehead and just didn't get it.  But here, his account of preparing for this big gambling journey is a very enjoyable read.  He suffers from some "issues" to say the least.  He feels like a failure, he is, perhaps depressed about his divorce.  He needs to learn how to play poker pretty well in hopes that he won't embarrass himself at the WSOP, the buy in which is being provided by a magazine for whom he will write a story.  In preparation, he takes the bus to Atlantic City regularly and practices his game.  He also hires a personal trainer, hooks up with a poker coach and immerses himself in poker culture.  In the end, I don't think this is a spoiler, he does NOT win it all. But he does do well enough that he feels like he didn't embarrass himself.  I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book.

Lunch at the Piccadilly

Lunch at the Piccadilly by Clyde Edgerton 266 pgs.

Carl's favorite aunt was always Lil, and they have a great relationship.  Lil never had kids of her own and Carl has been taking care of her and checking up on her for years.  Lil is now living in a nursing home although thinks she will be going home soon so has continued to pay rent on her apartment.  As the story goes, we find Lil to be quite a spitfire and Carl is a devoted and loving nephew.  There is little chance Lil is going to live alone again but Carl is patient with her and lets her be in charge.  The relationships of the residents of the nursing home and Carl befriending them, is heart warming.  This book isn't great but it is a nice way to pass an afternoon.

Everything is wrong with you

Everything is wrong with you: the modern woman's guide to finding self-confidence through self-loathing by Wendy Molyneux 182 pgs.

Molyneux recently served as a judge for the Tournament of Books over at the Morning News and is a writer for the incomparable Bob's Burgers.  I requested this book via Inter Library Loan thinking it looked funny.  And, parts of it *were* funny...just not very.  I think Molyneux is great and this book is more than I've ever written but was not for me.

Italy from the Source / Lonely Planet, written by Sarah Barrell, 272.pp.

As much a travel guide as a cookbook ('cause who wouldn't want to eat their way across Italy?), this gorgeously photographed book is broken into culinary regions, complete with maps and restaurant suggestions, as well as highlights of famous local chefs.  The recipes are not difficult but many ingredients are unlikely to be accessible; substitutions are sometimes offered.

I tried my own variation on the wild boar stew, which appears under several regional sections.  The only boar I could find was ground boar at a market in Rock Hill; I supplemented this with regular pork loin cut for stew.  Results were good if not earth-shattering; the same could be said for the parmesan/ricotta-based dumplings, called soffici, which went with a very simple vegetable soup.  These were very easy and so mild tasting that most children would eat them.

One Out of Two

One Out of Two by Daniel Sada, translated by Katherine Silver, 100 pages

Forty-something sisters Gloria and Constitucion Gamal are identical twins, with only an easily hidden birthmark distinguishing them. For their entire lives, they've embraced their similarity, wearing the same clothes, makeup and hairdo every day as they work together as tailors. But when a suitor emerges, they must determine the degree to which they are interchangeable.

While the story is intriguing, what makes this quirky short novel so fun and readable is how it's told. Sada presents the story as if he was telling it to a group of friends over a bottle or two of wine, and Silver does an excellent job of maintaining that feeling throughout. Through the telling, it's not easy to distinguish between the Gamal sisters, but that's kind of the point. It's a fun little story about sisterhood, and well worth the read.

Filmish

Filmish: A Graphic Journey Through Film by Edward Ross, 199 pages

Filmish is a comic book discussion of filmmaking, focusing on different ways of the medium is used (as an extension of the filmmaker's vision, as propaganda either for or against technology, as a way to manipulate time). For someone who knows absolutely nothing about filmmaking, I suppose this could be a good introduction to film analysis.

But.

To be completely honest, this reads like an undergrad thesis put to mediocre artwork (everyone has the same nose!). After paying lip service to the need for more women and people of color involved in filmmaking, Ross uses several examples to illustrate the rest of the book, none of which were made by women or people of color; instead, he discusses focuses on Christopher Nolan, James Cameron, Steven Spielberg, Stanley Kubrick, and George Lucas. And while he also talks about filmmakers using code words and double entrendres to get around censorship rules (such as the Hays Code and the stringent rules in modern-day Iran), he doesn't give us any names of those movies, which would be an excellent way to move the discussion forward.

Given that movies and comic books are both visual media, this could have been really cool. Maybe in the hands of Alison Bechdel or Noelle Stevenson. Sadly, this one isn't worth it.

Lafayette in the Somewhat United States / Sarah Vowell, 288 pp.

I tried reading this on paper and only got about halfway; listening to the audio I was, as always with Vowell, delighted.  Vowell brings Lafayette and his revolutionary times to life.  Depending on the listener, one might be tickled or annoyed to learn that the outcome of that fateful war was heavily determined by a boy, and a French one at that.  Lafayette's military prowess was important, but it may have been his influence at the French court and the millions that court ultimately provided that won the day.  Vowell makes Lafayette the man vivid; his wild enthusiasm for adventure and liberty and his father-love for George Washington are positively endearing.

Ultimately, though, I think Vowell uses historical figures and events as filters to examine what it means to be American, both now and in the past.  Her snarky, cynical take on things is oddly reassuring; if things look bleak now, they've looked bleaker before, and we seem to have survived.

Tales from the Loop

Tales from the Loop by Simon Stålenhag, 125 pages

I'm not sure whether to describe this as beautiful paintings accompanied by very short stories, or very short stories illustrated by beautiful paintings, but either way this wonderfully imaginative book tells the story of the people who lived and worked around the entirely fictitious Loop, a particle accelerator in a remote part of Sweden from the 1970s through 1990s. The paintings bring to life the odd robots, cooling towers, magnet-powered hover-vehicles, and various high-tech detritus that our unnamed narrator (perhaps Stålenhag, in his imagination?) saw everyday while he was growing up. This is a fascinating bit of speculative fiction, and Stålenhag's artwork is astounding.

The Whites / Richard Price writing as Harry Brandt, 333 pp.

Billy Graves and his former colleagues on a special anti-crime unit have 'Whites;' that is, they each have a horrible criminal who got away and whose freedom eats away at them.  But suddenly the Whites are turning up dead, and Billy needs to figure out why.  Meanwhile a secret from his wife Carmen's past threatens Billy's family.

If you like 'em hard-boiled this is the book for you.  Extremely dark and violent, this is a well-constructed and paced thriller.  Price/Brandt clearly knows his milieu, and he writes excellent dialogue.  I just can't enjoy stories quite so dark as this; it's so noir it's almost purple.

50 Great American Places

50 Great American Places: Essential Historic Sites Across the U.S. by Brent D. Glass, 293 pages

Written by the Director Emeritus of the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History, 50 Great American Places offers up short essays on the 50ish sites that Glass deems most important to telling the story of the U.S. I say "50ish" because there are way more than 50 places listed here, with several places grouped together by their proximity and/or general topic (the Brooklyn Bridge and the Statue of Liberty, and the Arch and the Cahokia Mounds are pretty close physically; the Little Bighorn Battlefield in Eastern Montana and Wounded Knee, South Dakota not so close physically but topically are grouped together). With the exception of the National Mall being listed first, the rest of the entries are listed chronologically, starting with the Cahokia Mounds and weaving through the next 1,000 years, and offering a wonderful history of the country through architecture, monuments, battlegrounds, and malls. I particularly like how Glass included all elements of our culture (military, yes, but also music, literature, technology, and urban planning) and didn't shy away from the uglier parts of our history (Minidoka Internment Camp and Salem, Massachusetts are both included). It's fascinating to see what a historian as esteemed as Glass thinks are the most essential sites in American History. I loved reading this book, and I love the list of places to visit that I created along the way.