REMARKABLE CREATURES by Tracy Chevalier

Mary Anning may be one of the most famous real-life heroines you’ve never heard of. She was the first to discover an ichthyosaurus and complete pterosaur in Lyme, Great Britain, as well as the squaloraja, a transition animal between sharks and rays. he and her older friend Elizabeth Philpot – a middle-age spinster whose fossil fish collection ended up in Oxford – are now given their due in this complex and fascinating novel by Tracy Chevalier.

November 20, 2010 · Judi Clark · No Comments
Tags: , , ,  Â· Posted in: Class - Race - Gender, Facing History, Reading Guide

EMILY HUDSON by Melissa Jones

The heroine of EMILY HUDSON, by Melissa Jones, is a nineteen-year old orphan forced by tragic circumstances to live in Newport with her stern, condescending, and verbally abusive uncle, distant aunt, and two cousins, William and Mary. The year is 1861, just before the outbreak of the Civil War. Emily is immature, high-spirited, and moody, with a tendency to blurt out whatever she thinks, regardless of the consequences. Since she has no fortune and her relatives care little for her, it would seem that Emily’s future will be bleak. However, William, an aspiring writer loosely modeled on Henry James, decides to finance art lessons and a stay in Europe for his cousin. Before she leaves, Emily has a brief relationship with a kind and agreeable gentleman soldier named Captain Lindsay.

October 11, 2010 · Judi Clark · No Comments
Tags: , , , ,  Â· Posted in: Coming-of-Age, Facing History, NE & New York, Reading Guide

HALF BROKE HORSES by Jeannette Walls

Jeannette Walls is a natural-born storyteller. In her memoir THE GLASS CASTLE, she described in fascinating detail what it meant to be the daughter of Rose Mary and Rex, perhaps two of the most dysfunctional individuals on the planet, brainy underachievers who raised their bevy of children in a most unconventional way.

By the end of that book, Jeannette was on her way to graduating from BARNARD COLLEGE and becoming a celebrated journalist in New York City. I exited the book wanting to know more and in ways, HALF BROKE HORSES goes back to the well, helping readers understand the forces that shaped her mother Rose Mary.

September 18, 2010 · Judi Clark · No Comments
Tags:  Â· Posted in: Facing History, Family Matters, US Southwest, Wild West

NASHVILLE CHROME by Rick Bass

I’ve often thought that being famous must be a horrible burden. There would be the fun bits, of course, but there’s a definite downside: the psycho fans, the paparazzi, and the fact that every little thing you do could potentially end up on the cover of National Enquirer. But perhaps what’s even worse than being famous is tasting fame and then fading into complete obscurity.

Rick Bass’s novel Nashville Chrome is a fictionalized account of the Browns: Maxine. Jim Ed, and Bonnie. At the height of their fame, this singing trio was second only to Elvis, and even the Beatles shared a few jam sessions with their idols. Have you ever heard of the Browns? I hadn’t, and I’ll admit that I was some way into the novel before it dawned on me that this is a story of very real and very forgotten people.

September 16, 2010 · Judi Clark · No Comments
Tags: , , , , ,  Â· Posted in: Facing History

A CURABLE ROMANTIC by Joseph Skibell

Science, religion, and language intersect in this edgy, Judeo-mystic satire about love, brotherhood, and neuroses in fin-de-siècle Vienna. In 1895, oculist Jakob Sammelsohn meets Sigmund Freud on the same night that he eyes and falls in love with Freud’s primary patient, Emma Eckstein. As Jakob is guided into Freud’s world of psychoanalysis, he reluctantly becomes a guide himself. He plunges into the mythological realm of a dybbuk, the dislocated spirit of his dead wife, Ita, who possesses and inhabits Emma. Or so Ita-as-Emma claims. As the relationship intensifies between Jakob, Freud, and Emma, Ita’s haunting voice lures Jakob into a psychosexual seduction.

September 9, 2010 · Judi Clark · No Comments
Tags: , , , , , ,  Â· Posted in: Contemporary, Facing History, Literary

THE GOLDEN MEAN by Annabel Lyon

The best books are not necessarily those with dazzling prose or mind-numbing theories. The best books are those that steal up on you, and lead you gently into a world made real, not by an abundance of detail, but by honestly rendered characters that, from the very first page, so completely captivate that before you know it, you’ve read half the book and there are but a few hours until dawn. That is, the best books understand the allure – our insatisfiable longing to compare and contrast our minds with others – of interesting characters. Annabel Lyon’s THE GOLDEN MEAN is such a book, and her accomplishment – the surprising irresistibility of her story – is all the more incredible when you consider that she’s chosen to focus on rather prosaic moments in a great man’s life.

September 7, 2010 · Judi Clark · No Comments
Tags: , , ,  Â· Posted in: Facing History