Peace Like a River

"And so I sound like a man making the most marginal sense - as if I were describing one of those dreams that seemed so genuine at the time." - Reuben

Peace Like a River, by Leif Enger was exactly that, a story of marginal sense.  It was clouded and confusing as some dreams are, and I yearned for when I would wake.  

The story of the unfortunate Land family is set in the cold, bleak, wintry world of North Dakota and Minnesota.  Hardship and faith are the cornerstones of the family's foundation.  Their ability to cling to one while enduring the other is what constitutes most of the book.

Reuben, a sickly eleven year old boy is the young narrator of the story.  He tells of his family's struggles and strength with a boyishness that is aptly written.  He is witness to many strange miracles done at the hands of his devout father, a school janitor, yet does not question or doubt their happening.  He also witnesses two boys get shot to death at the hands of his brother, yet blindly continues to worship him.  

The frequent episodes of the seemingly insignificant miracles do little to offer hope or salvation for any of the Lands, or to the book.  I thought the strong characters like Swede (the sister) and Davy (the brother) were as infirm as Reuben's asthmatic lungs, not allowed to fully develop in the story.  The weak characters, (everyone else) were as numerous and as paltry as the miracles.  The power of the prophetic father, as a single parent, and a healer was thrown away to Reuben's fleeting attention span and naive grasp on the tragedies befalling their family.  I felt there could have been so much more depth and interest to the story if we had been offered another point of view.  

There were redeeming factors in Enger's writing and imagination, but for the most part I thought Peace like a River was as bland and bleak as the scenery so expertly described.

 

The Meanest Doll in the World

*Submitted by guest reviewer Virginia Felder, age 8*

Hi, this is Virginia and I'm going to tell you about The Meanest Doll in the World, by Ann Martin and Laura Godwin.  

The story is about two dolls who go on a huge adventure starting from the attic where they live, to a school, and then to BJ's house where they meet the meanest doll in the world.  Her name is Mean Mimi.  She is mean because she is unable to be friends with four dolls that she really wants to be friends with.

This is the second book in the Doll People series, and I really liked this one.  I did have some scary dreams while I was reading it, but I still would tell you to read it.

-Virginia

Masterpiece

*Submitted by Kurt Felder, guest reviewer, age 9*

Masterpiece, by Elise Broach is an exciting, scary adventure story.  Marvin is the main character.  He is a beetle who lives in an apartment.  Marvin's best friend is a human named James, a ten year old boy.  

James, art, and his family are the most valuable things in Marvin's life and they are in danger!

Marvin, James and James's father are on a case to see who has stolen the four "Virtues" by the artist Durer.  They have to look all over New York City for the four stolen drawings.

I think you should read this book because it is exciting, full of adventure, and mystery.  It is a little bit hilarious and anyone would like it.

-Kurt

LAMB - The Gospel According to Biff

"I suppose that every boy wonders what he will be when he grows up.  I suppose that many watch their peers accomplish great things and wonder, 'Could I have done that?' For me, to know at ten that my best friend was the Messiah, while I would live and die a stonecutter, seemed too much of a curse for a ten-year-old to bear." -Biff

LAMB by Christopher Moore is a laugh out loud, thought provoking, insightful and refreshing look into the life of perhaps the most famous person that has ever lived.  The story is told from the point of view of Christ's best friend, Biff, but LAMB doesn't preach or make fun of religion. It simply tells the story of two great friends and their time together.

Joshua (Jesus) soon learns he needs to venture out into the world and learn how to be the Messiah. There is no hesitation in Biff as he takes his place is beside his friend, with no thought at all as to where their journey will take them.  Joseph tells Biff, "You go with Joshua.  He needs a friend to teach him to be human."  More than anything we see Joshua, aka; Jesus, as a human.  As Joshua learns, Biffs learns along side him, each coming away with vastly different, but complimentary knowledge.  

Joshua very much depends on Biff, on their friendship.  He seeks out his counsel, his advice, his humor.  They have amazing philosophical conversations, they study Taoism, Confucianism, Buddhism, yoga, as well as argue the Torah.  Without Biff Joshua would not have been the Messiah he came to be.

The humor, humanity and heart in this book are wonderful.  It takes the reader on an amazing journey of good friends who grow to become men, who learn to abandon their selfishness, strive for greatness and change the world.  LAMB truly is a must read.

Sin in the Second City

"It is not adequate to define a prostitute simply as a woman who sells her body...That is done every day by women who become wives in order to gain a home and a livelihood." Havelock Ellis

  

Sin in the Second City, by Karen Abbott, follows the lives of the Everleigh sisters, Ada and Minna, madams of Chicago's most notorious brothel, the Everleigh Club.  The sisters move to Chicago's Levee district just after the Worlds Fair in the late 1890's, when whoring was a well practiced and accepted vice, from the very wealthy to the destitute.  The sisters created a brothel like no other Chicago had seen.  Their "butterflies", the finest females courtesans, were surrounded with the best care and finest clothes, and the club itself was furnished like a palace where its "customers gained entry only with a solid letter of referral".

The sisters were honest, upstanding women who managed to survive and succeed in a city sick with corruption.  By night, the Everleigh Club entertained Chicago's most powerful politicians and lawmen, famous businessmen and entertainers from all over the world.  Yet would suffer mightily under constant public scrutiny, growing political pressures and religious reformers by day.

"I don't mind mankind's crimes, but I do mind its hypocrisy" - Minna Everleigh

Not only does Karen Abbott open our eyes to this first class brothel, she parallels this story with other brothels that were in stark contrast.  The majority of the other brothels in the city were filthy, with drug addicted prostitutes or "white slaves", under the control of madams/owners who sought only to make money no matter the consequences.  

This trafficking of women became a national concern as nearly 100,000 girls a year were abducted, tricked or forced into prostitution.  The religious and political prosecution of ending "white slavery", a major part of this novel, would eventually lead to the end of the Levee district in Chicago.

Karen Abbott is a skilled writer, compiling an amazing amount of information with astonishing detail of all aspects of life in Chicago during the first decade of the 1900's.  She has expertly woven different strands of life, facts, and happenings into a seamless story that is both interesting and educating.  Sin in the Second City is not a fast read, or one that effectively held my attention the whole time, but I did gain from reading it.  It read like a novel yet has the meat of a history course.

Educational and entertaining, yet requires a commitment to complete.

Bleeding Hearts

I had high expectations with this murder/mystery book, "Bleeding Hearts" by Ian Rankin, as it was marketed to me that he is like "an English Michael Connelly".  I love a good mystery book and Michael Connelly's writing and his stories are some of my favorites! 

But this was no Michael Connelly mystery.  

"Bleeding Hearts" was slow to start.  In the middle of chapter 4 (30 pages in) I found myself wondering if and when this story was going to get moving.  The plot line was muddied with purposeless confusion; character names that were too alike and too many characters offering little to the main character's development or to the already scrambling plot (book extras).

There was love, which is always appealing, and characters who struggle between the good and bad within themselves.  But there wasn't anything that kept the reader thinking, guessing, trying to puzzle it all out before the end (which of course in a good book would be a total surprise). 

There was a late-in-the-game charge of action that I had hoped would lead to an end with a bang and save my overall feeling about the story, but the ending was a total let down. It sputtered to a final close that mirrored its laborious beginning.  

Basically it just wasn't what I expected and hoped it would be.  Ian Rankin is a talented writer, and has awards to prove it, but I was disappointed in this piece.  

Mildly entertaining but ultimately disappointing.