Book Review: Quiet

 Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World that Can't Stop Talking, by Susan Cain is one of those books that I wish I had written.  Page for page, I can't remember the last time I nodded, gasped or exclaimed in agreement and recognition of a nonfiction author's observations; observations that seem so obvious and common sense, but I had never seen articulated before.  I've known I was an introvert for, well, forever, and I've also always intuitively known that fitting into the world was harder for me than for others.  Self-fulfilling prophecy? No, now I think it is the Extrovert Ideal of our culture working itself out.  How many times have I been told to get a thicker skin, not to take things personally, be tougher, more assertive... and how many more times than that I could, again intuitively, tell that someone was thinking that in my direction.  Here, finally, is some positive reinforcement for those of us who have to mentally arm ourselves for the sensory assault of going out into the world and come home exhausted every day; we are actually important to the smooth functioning of society, whether or not society sees it that way.  Just give us our personal space, respect our need for down-time to recharge the batteries, and whatever you do, don't put us in an open office plan and subject us to endless interruptions, multitasking and meetings.

Cain visits such extrovert-only environments as Harvard Business School, Tony Robbins seminars, and Rick Warren's Saddleback Church to explore the extent of modern America's culture of extroversion.  It wasn't always this way; in the early days of this country, much more emphasis was placed on character, and many presidents were introverted.  It's hard to imagine that happening now.

She explores the complementary relationship (albeit deeply strained) between FDR the extrovert and Eleanor the introvert, Eleanor serving as moral compass to Franklin's energy.  In the same way, Rosa Parks was the quiet strength behind the Civil Rights movement energetically led by Martin Luther King (whom Cain assumes to be extroverted, although I've read differing opinions on that).  The unique difficulties of relationships between sometimes conflicting personalities are explored briefly.  Then she goes into the science behind the differences in the brains of introverts and extroverts.  This is fascinating information, some of it very new neuroscience.  I suspect her spot on the political spectrum is further left than I'm used to, judging by her examples (Darwin, Gandhi, Al Gore(?)) and the evolutionary assumptions underlying her scientific explanations.  I still think learning about the neocortex and the amygdala is a valuable exercise.  So it's the "fight or flight reaction" I'm experiencing every weekday when I walk into the boisterous 8th grade class.  Good to know, I guess, and it explains why I feel compelled to advocate for the concerns of my introverted students, who are in danger of being overlooked.

I really appreciated the final chapter on education and introverted children, and I believe all teachers should read it.  Our current system is heavily weighted toward group activities, which favor extroverts and leave no time for the quiet individual practice (10,000 hours to achieve excellence) and deep thought needed to perfect a skill.  In addition, the pushiest of extroverts tend to take over a group, introverts shut down rather than participate, and are left feeling there is something wrong with them, when they make up anywhere from 1/3 to 1/2 of the population.  I also really liked her brief historical survey at the very end of the book; attitudes toward introversion and extroversion through the ages.  Jacob and Esau; the four "humors" (melancholy and phlegmatic being the introverted ones); Milton's Il Penseroso as opposed to L'Allegro.

Yarn-Along and Bloom

So, knitting.  The Yarn-Along.  I am approaching the bottom edge of the interminable cardigan.  It seems like I've been approaching the right length for a month but it's been shrinking as I knit.  But, I knit another inch on Monday and it's about time to start the border pattern.  And I started a sleeve for Daniel's I-pad.  This is the third time I've started it, and I think I might keep going now.  Sometimes you just want to knit garter stitch, and I'm having one of those summers.  Maybe next week I'll be knitting dishcloths.

I recently finished reading Bloom: Finding Beauty in the Unexpected, by Kelle Hampton.  It's a sweet and very real book about the unexpected birth of a baby with Down syndrome.  I've been a follower of Kelle's blog for some time now, so I was glad to be able to read this book.  It's funny, the things we DS moms have in common, and the things we do not.  If I wrote my memoirs of giving birth to Tertia, it would be much more Erma Bombeck, and with not very good photography, and not nearly enough of the chatty girlfriends camping in my hospital room.  What a great idea, a pajama party at the hospital!  But most of the book is not so frivolous and is really a nice, personal memoir that could be appreciated by many families who receive an unexpected diagnosis.  The author is an accomplished photographer so the pictures are lovely, too.

Daniel and Quarta have been reading a lot this summer; here they are teasing Tertia by taking over her bed.  Daniel is somewhere deep in the Wheel of Time saga; Quarta is tearing through Muddle Earth, Edge Chronicles, the Oracles of Delphi Keep, and a bunch of Warriors books.  Tertia is comfortably re-re-reading the Harry Potter books.

No Disney Princess posters were harmed in writing this blog.

Disability, Medical Ethics, and Embracing it All

Today I'm posting, in part, in the T-21 blog hop to raise awareness about Down syndrome.  Related to that, I've been thinking a lot lately about - how to phrase it - the lack of equity in the medical treatment of people with disabilities.  Check yesterday's post for my musings on it.  It's not just medical treatment I'm thinking about - the Ethan Saylor case is an example of a crying need for better training for law enforcement workers.  But as long as the disabled, particularly those with mental disabilities, are ever-so-subtly denied the same treatment as the rest of us, there is a need for more vocal advocacy.  I'm not really an activist, but the thought of how vulnerable my own child could be in so many situations is sobering.

The central issue for me: do doctors give the same quality of care to a person with a perceived mental handicap as they give to a person with "normal" brain function?

Embracing Quincy, Our Journey Together was the first book I read on my new Amazon Kindle. It was free for a few days after Christmas when I was poking around, and it immediately resonated as something I would want to read, even though I knew it would be a heart-wrenching book.  It's the story of a family whose unborn daughter is diagnosed with one of the most frightening of genetic disorders - Trisomy 18.  As the author states, medical treatment for Trisomy 18 is currently where Down syndrome was in the 1950's.  Children born with the condition rarely survive for long, and when they do, it's because of the passionate advocacy and tireless devotion of their parents.  As the parent of a child with Down syndrome, I feel like my life is one of ease and luxury by comparison, and my daughter's condition is a walk in the park.  But for anyone who cares for a disabled person, and especially for neonatologists and doctors who deal with high-risk pregnancies, I'd recommend this book as a snapshot of how one family perceived the medical establishment and its treatment of their child.

It's a disjointed read, with a lot of flashbacks and more or less unrelated stories, but it is sweetly written for all that.  The author is what I would describe as a New Agey flake -- she tries to visualize her unborn child to better health, she practices meditation and has psychic readings, she muses about her own personal history and how it fits into the cosmos.  Having had one abortion, she turns down the doctors when they urge termination in this case.  She seems to put equal faith in the name-it-and-claim-it theology of some charismatic Christians and the occult philosophy of the "law of attraction."  As head-shaking and bizarre as I personally found some parts of this memoir, none of that should matter.  The medical community failed her and her daughter at a point when they were most vulnerable, and there was a decided lack of basic human compassion in their treatment of her.  This shouldn't happen.  Period.  No matter what you think of the religious beliefs or lifestyle of the parents.  And compassion, given regardless of diagnosis, would be the best place to start in every case, I think.

Book Review: How Civilizations Die (And Why Islam is Dying Too)

Another book I've been meaning to review for about a month is David Goldman's How Civilizations Die (And Why Islam is Dying Too).  It's a fascinating book, a shocking book, a depressing and uplifting book at the same time.  It's well worth the reading for anyone with an interest in history, religion, and culture.  It makes a compelling argument for American exceptionalism, whether you agree with Goldman's conclusions or not.  And it give a sobering look into the root causes and possible outcomes of the growing unrest and breakdown in the Islamic world.

There's a story behind population statistics, beyond the infographics and the demographics and the glib summaries that make it into the few news articles published in this field.  Goldman searches it out and gives us a sense of current events and a reasonable forecast of the near future.  Put quite simply, some civilizations commit suicide.  They lose the will to live; they see the handwriting on the wall and stop reproducing themselves.  Sometimes the decline is gradual and not necessarily catastrophic; the wealthy nations of Europe, for example, are able to provide for their elderly population in reasonable comfort even though the birth rate is below replacement levels and expected to continue so.  But in the Muslim countries where tribalism is still the main cultural tradition, where marriage between cousins is preferred and literacy is low, the birth rates are declining drastically.  Although the fertility rate (number of children per woman) is declining overall worldwide, it is declining much faster in countries like Egypt, Iran, Pakistan, and Turkey.  Forecasts predict that if current trends continue, but 2070 Iran will have a more elderly population than Europe.  And without sophisticated pension plans and health care systems, that is likely to provoke a crisis long before then.  Iran was the first Islamic republic; it is a bellwether for the countries that are emulating it, but the statistics are not encouraging: rampant drug use and prostitution as educated people who see no future in their culture try to numb their existential pain.

A civilization that knows it has no hope and is drawing near to extinction does not go gently into that good night.  On the contrary, history shows that adherents to doomed causes are likely to fight with more desperation and violence than those on the cultural upswing.  Goldman details three great extinctions of civilizations in recorded history -- the city-states of the Eastern Mediterranean in the 12th century B.C., Hellenistic civilization in the 2nd and 1st centuries B.C., and of course Rome.  All of them, he argues, fell in large part due to moral decay.  Islam, he predicts, is caught up in the 4th great extinction, although in the short term that is no consolation to the other civilizations that have to deal with it, as with a fatally wounded animal.

Why is population at risk of collapse in so many regions of the world but not in America?  Goldman argues that America was founded on the Calvinistic principle of Election - America, and Americans, are chosen by God for a special purpose, not to be confused with the nationalistic, idolatrous state religions of Europe.  At the same time, the Evangelical Christian impulse in America has always put a strong emphasis on the individual and the individual's responsibility before God.  This too is distinct from the way religion was historically practiced in Europe.  It is not possible to export American-style democracy to places like Iraq or Afghanistan, he claims, because such civilizations lack the fundamental framework for understanding and supporting freedom.  Nor is it possible, as the current administration seems to think, that if America dis-engages from world affairs, the rest of the world will fix itself.  Only by slow and non-governmental means -- as for example, the patient work of Christian missionaries -- can a culture hostile to individual liberty be transformed.  Goldman (who is Jewish, not Christian) espouses a foreign policy he calls "Augustinian realism" based on Augustine's City of God. If America falls too, which is a possibility he concedes, it will be as Rome fell; not to be replaced by a superior military power, but by a slow emergence of newer Christian civilizations, most likely from the global South and China.

Book Review: Secret Thoughts of an Unlikely Convert

The SecretThoughts of an Unlikely Convert, by Rosaria Champagne Butterfield is my book review today.  It’s been a few weeks since I finished reading it, and while it’s a small book and a quick, pageturning read, I’m still finding myself fascinated by some of the issues it raises.  It is particularly well worth the reading for anyone with an interest in Christianity and culture.

Rosaria Champagne was a postmodern lesbian feminist professor of English at Syracuse University, working on a book denouncing the religious right, when she received a letter from a local pastor in 1999 and her world rather quickly fell apart.  She struck up an unlikely friendship with this Reformed Presbyterian pastor and his wife, leading to a spiritual crisis in her own life and a painful, messy conversion she describes as a train wreck.  Central to her conversion was the conviction that the Bible she began to study critically was both authentic and morally authoritative; and this changed her life radically.  She left her partner, eventually left her tenured position; lost most of what was once important to her in the process.  She is now married to a pastor and the full-time, homeschooling mother of 4 adopted children.

Pause with me a moment in wonder that not only did she convert from radical lesbianism to conservative Christianity, but she became an RP, embracing exclusive psalmody and a few other quirks that even most conservative Christians might balk at.  This is akin, in my mind, to Elijah's dousing the altar with water before confidently awaiting the fire from heaven: there is really nothing too hard for the God we serve; perhaps we should not be so surprised.

Rosaria Butterfield's book is making some serious waves in the Christian community.  You can see her interview with Marvin Olasky that originally brought her to a much wider audience, as well as other video and audio resources, here.

This is a tiny book but it contains the seeds of enough books to fill an entire library, and I would want to read almost every one.  When I picked it up, I expected a spiritual autobiography, and got it.  Rosaria has a fascinating conversion story, messy and painful and controversial as it may be, and one that can and should be retold to a wider audience.  This will undoubtedly take its place alongside Augustine's Confessions and C.S. Lewis' Surprised by Joy as a memorable example of the genre.  But it is also a small treatise on the topic of Christianity and culture, which is endlessly fascinating to me, and I’d love to see more from her on this topic.  Coming from the very different background she does, Rosaria challenges the church to practice hospitality, minister to orphans and those in distress, and engage the culture in countless ways.  She speaks with authority on this front because her own life was transformed by such simple acts.  She speaks with compassion because it wasn't a perfect, immediate transformation.

Her book is also an indictment of the secular postmodern academic world, with its fill-in-the-blank studies departments refusing to offer tolerance to anyone who doesn’t fit in.  I would love to see more of the autobiographical description of how she disentangled from that world and arrived at the nearly polar opposite of Christian homeschooling.  As someone who seriously considered post-graduate education but backed away from it because of the anti-Christian bigotry of the academic industrial complex, I'm curious about how to counsel my own children and students as they enter that hostile world.  How should the ethical Christian behave in academia, and what are some wise strategies to follow if we are called down that road?  Does she regret leaving it behind and does she hope to return to university teaching someday?

There is a bit of mostly gentle critique of the complacency of certain aspects of the Evangelical Christian subculture; e.g., reflexive criticism of public schools, bigotry against those with a messy or sinful past, unwillingness to consider adoption.  She and her husband lived and ministered for several years near Patrick Henry College, so having just recently read and reviewed God's Harvard, I found these aspects of her story intriguing.  Evangelical Christians would do well to read her book for the sole purpose of seeing themselves as the world sees us.  And of course, the attention-grabbing issue of homosexuality is front and center in the American culture war right now.  That's probably why the book is receiving so much attention; however, "outreach" to the gay and lesbian community is not really more than a minor focus of the book.

Even more minor in emphasis, but I can't let this review go without mentioning them: three areas of special interest to me personally.  There is knitting!  And Latin instruction (with a nod to the particular importance of verbs!)  And parenting children with special needs.  Bottom line: this is a must-read book for Christians who want to engage the anti-Christian culture compassionately.

Book Review: God's Harvard

I thought when I began to read God's Harvard: A Christian College on a Mission to Save America, by Hanna Rosin, that I would be even more annoyed by it than I was by A Year of Biblical Womanhood, which I read in the same time period.  God's Harvard, published in 2006, is an in-depth examination of the politically active evangelical culture at Patrick Henry College.  Rosin, an Israeli-born Jew who writes about religion for the Washington Post, had unprecedented access to faculty and students during a controversy-laden turning point in the college's growth.  I expected what I've come to expect from members of the mainstream media, a bash-the-fundies, anti-evangelical diatribe designed to mock and belittle.  But to Rosin's credit, she unfailingly treats both faculty and students with respect and human decency while delivering well-written, thoughtful analysis of the not-quite-perfectly overlapping streams of Christian culture prevalent at Patrick Henry: homeschooling, fundamentalist legalism, political activism, and high academic achievement.  Gone are the days, thankfully, when the Washington Post pigeonholed evangelical Christians as "poor, uneducated, and easy to command."  This is still an outsider's view of the Religious Right, but Rosin made a more conscientious effort to understand the "opposition" than Rachel Held Evans (who is a liberal Christian herself) did in A Year of Biblical Womanhood.

I attended 3 different Christian schools; the one I graduated from was a "start-up" that no longer exists.  I went to a well-established Christian college. Both my sisters went to a "start-up" Christian college that no longer exists. I now teach at a school which started around the same time as Patrick Henry.  Before that, I homeschooled Daniel for a year.  All of this is to say, I have experienced first-hand the culture that makes up Christian schools and colleges like Patrick Henry, and the growing pains that every new institution of learning goes through.  There comes a point when the initial start-up enthusiasm wanes and members of the community realize they don't necessarily share the same vision; what happens next will determine the future of the institution.

In the case of Patrick Henry, the crisis point came at least partly as a result of the big personality of its founder, Michael Farris.  Farris, who came to prominence as a homeschool activist, wanted a contemporary Christian response to the apostasy of the Ivy League colleges; a Christian institution of the highest academic caliber that would turn out graduates well-prepared for careers in government and entertainment.  And to some degree, he got it.  Talented professors flocked to design courses with a God-centered focus; bright and idealistic young people, the majority of them homeschooled by devout Christian parents, raced to enroll and compete for various academic honors.  Conservative Republican leadership in nearby Washington, D.C. offered amazing opportunities for internships and political experience to PHC students.  The college filled an important niche -- more academic than the typical Bible college, but still a "safe" place to send sheltered children.  If you think there is not a demand for this type of school, you are out of touch with a sizable segment of American culture.

But Farris' vision for politically astute Christian activism conflicted with a tendency to over-idealize the Founding Fathers; his desire for a rigorous, classical curriculum conflicted with his own pietistic disdain for the pagans and their influence; and most interestingly (to me) his expressed desire for high-level Christian scholarship conflicted with his disdain for some of the highest-level Christian scholars, like Augustine and Calvin.  Calvinists and Anglicans are "supposed friends of religious liberty who are actually enemies," according to Farris.

The real heroes of religious freedom were the uneducated Baptists and Quakers, who wanted to engage with their Bible in their own way, unmediated.  "Me and God, that's where liberty comes from," said Farris... Now it happened that most of the professors on Farris's staff were Calvinists, and philosophers to boot.  (p. 120)

 It was at this point that I knew things were not going to end well.  Rosin tracks one professor in particular -- Robert Stacey, who by all accounts developed a remarkable and challenging course in government and political philosophy.  But he and other professors pushed perhaps a little too hard for a nuanced view of their respective subjects, and asked students to think about things that were uncomfortable for some.  Five professors, convinced their academic freedom was being hampered, resigned together in the spring of 2006.  Farris resigned as president and now serves as college Chancellor, with Gene Edward Veith, a leading thinker in the field of Christianity and culture, serving as Provost.  Unfortunately, Rosin's book ends before describing the changes that have taken place since that time.

Rosin spends more time describing the college from the students' point of view, and that's part of the appeal of a book like this.  Students have different concerns than the professors' for academic freedom -- there is a lot of recorded grumbling about rigid dress and behavior codes, including a culture of informing on other students who broke rules.  We get to go along the campaign trail with a carload of young campaigners, home for break to visit different families, inside the dorm wing where the campus rebels hang out, even to visit a few grads in their post-college jobs.

God's Harvard is of interest to any Christians involved in trying to build Christian institutions of learning and those who have a background in the culture wars.  It's also fascinating to see the picture of campus life at a Christian college, although perhaps a little disturbing for those of us parents who worry about sending kids off into that world -- no matter how sheltered the environment, there are dangers for the unwary.  It's certainly not always comfortable to read, and it could be criticized for more focus on rebels and naysayers than on more compliant students - although considering the access Rosin was given, she rarely takes a cheap shot even when there's a golden opportunity.  And she is quick to point out that the rebellious students at PHC would be model students anywhere else.  I loved the fly-on-the-wall picture of life at PHC and wish somehow I could read an update now, 7 years later with new leadership and a presumably more sophisticated vision for the future -- but this is the kind of book that can only be written once.

Book Review: A Year of Biblical Womanhood

As soon as I saw A Year of Biblical Womanhood by Rachel Held Evans on the library shelf, I knew two things.  I was going to feel compelled to read it, and I was going to be seriously annoyed by it.  I was right on both counts.

A self-described liberated woman and popular blogger with ties to the evangelical Christian culture (she lives in the Bible Belt - beyond that, I'm not sure), Evans got a sweetheart book deal from Thomas Nelson: interpret the Bible's commands to women literally for a year and write about it.  Now, I've been blogging for a few years and I like the blogs that have interesting challenges: cook every recipe in Julia Child's cookbook; make a different quilt block or knitted afghan square every day; tell your family's story in pictures throughout the year.  There have been some enjoyable books and even movies that have resulted.  I'm still waiting for the book deal that combines my unique perspective on knitting, quilting, special needs parenting, and Latin instruction for the 21st century.  It's probably a niche market and I'm not holding my breath.  But whatever. If you can turn your personal blogging challenge into a book deal, my attitude is, "Nice work if you can get it."

But some of the free-spirited zaniness that might be appropriate in a blog challenge almost seems to become a stunt for the purpose of this book-length project, and if you add that to the sacredness of the text she is examining, it becomes, if not offensive, at least irritating, for those of us who do indeed believe that text is sacred.  Maybe it's when she makes herself sit on the roof of her house in penance for her "contentious" words.  Or when she pitches a tent in her yard during that time of the month.  Or spends a month calling her husband "master" - taking as her example not the biblical Sarah, but I Dream of Jeannie.  I've often said I'll tolerate any amount of heresy as long as it's well-written, and Evans certainly has a nice approachable prose style, but the fact that she has an axe to grind sucks some of the air out of her breezy style, for me.

The underlying premise of this book supports an "egalitarian" vs. "complementarian" view of the role of women in the Bible.  That much is fairly obvious, although I personally think the real issue is the doctrine of the inerrancy of Scripture.  It's a key issue in Christian culture and one that sooner or later will become a hot button for just about everyone. Evans is at her best when she leaves off the gimmicks at the end of each chapter and delves into the lives of various women of the Bible using honest exegesis with no snark attached.  You may or may not agree with her conclusions, but she is clearly a fellow-Christian and deserves the benefit of assuming her intentions are good.  But then, combating the teaching that women should be silent and not teach in the church, she becomes rather flippant: just throw a head covering on and say you're prophesying, is her advice.

Evans interviews an interesting assortment of traditionalist women; a practicing Amish woman and another who has left that tradition; a Christian polygamist (her husband met another woman but didn't feel right divorcing her, so decided God was calling him to a life of polygamy); an orthodox Jewish woman.  I feel her treatment of conservative evangelical Protestant women was sketchy to nonexistent,  almost as if she was more comfortable setting up straw women from the fringes of Christian culture rather than engaging with a real live woman who disagreed with her.  I didn't find her disrespectful of traditions she disagreed with, but she kept them at arm's distance while pretending to take the Bible literally.  So, I guess I question her intellectual honesty.

Some petty things I wondered about as I was reading it: why would you choose Martha Stewart as your arbiter of all things Proverbs 31?  Why a battery-operated baby Think-it-Over to teach a 30-year-old woman about parenting, rather than volunteer time spent comforting real babies or helping real moms?  Why does buying fair trade organic coffee and chocolate make you a champion of the poor, and did you ever really eat guinea pig, or was that just a catchy chapter title?  And come on, it's not really that impossibly beyond you to sew and knit.  Some of us even do it for fun.

Randomday, Random Book Review

Two weeks of the school year down.  I love teaching, but it is all-consuming and there seems to be no way for me to do it without family life suffering and risking depression and burnout.  And always there is the sheer physical and emotional exhaustion.  And I'm just a part-time teacher.  I wonder how the full-timers manage.  Please understand, I'm not complaining.  It's just a fact of life.  I often think of the final scene of Goodbye, Mr. Chips.  Life goes on, but it rarely ends well for the teacher.  I think it's no coincidence that the iconic teachers in the classical tradition have always been single, no children.  (Those nuns in the Catholic schools!)

There are new challenges every year.  This year, it's not having a Latin room and having to itinerate from class to class.  I have to prep all my materials in advance and stage my day with the tactical foresight of Julius Caesar besieging Alesia.  My classrooms are deep rather than broad, so the unforeseen consequence of that is that my handwriting on the board is not large enough for the kids in back to see.  I have to practice writing big.  And there are new students - one completely new to Latin in 8th grade, and others who have had it before but need to be worked in and have gaps made up.  I'm sure I'll manage.  I'm not so sure that all my students will love Latin and get awesome grades.  I'm not even sure all my own children will love and respect me.  Come to think of it, it would be kind of strange if I were sure.

There are things that are refreshingly the same every year.  Sixth grade students are always very literal.  Some of them are going through growth spurts, but I always find it a fun wake-up call that their minds still need to be babysat with the step-by step instructions that you would give to preschoolers, repeated frequently and with assurance that it is All Going To Be Okay.  Seventh grade students are in full-on puberty and even the sharpest of them may space out from time to time; but it is encouraging that, all hormones aside, they have brains that can and should be developed.  And I get to help with that.  I'm not nearly as willing to do the babysitting of literal brains at this age, though.  It's okay, because most of them come to realize they don't want it anymore anyway.  In 8th grade, it's obvious they don't want it.  They're fully in charge of their own study habits and it's a delicate balance how much I should repeat the kind of things that are necessary in 6th grade, but in 8th grade can become ad nauseam very quickly.  You can see those cute little 6th graders slipping away and being replaced by young adults, not quite but almost mature.  And then, faster than you'd think, they're on to 9th grade and I only see them in passing.

Quarta is a new 6th grader this year.  Tragically, her pet hamster Winky died this week.  Tertia is plugging away in 8th grade in her public school.  It's hard not being able to be very involved with her daily routine, but I do get to be with her at the beginning and end of it.  Secundus is in 11th grade, working very hard and running cross country.  His pickup truck is operational now!  He may start driving himself to school soon.  We think he may have broken his toe back in August when he ran into a metal pipe while playing frisbee at Family Camp.  It isn't moving right, but he did manage to run a marathon on it last weekend.  Apparently it's not hurting too much, but I need to take him in to have it x-rayed.  Daniel is loving life on the AEX hall at Grove City College.  The rest of us are missing him.

Not much in the way of knitting or quilting is getting done... a bit of mending and just enough knitting not to be at a total standstill.  I have been trying to trap fruit flies with vinegar traps, but the best way seems to be to leave the lid of the compost bucket ajar and then close it suddenly before taking them out.  Steve is happy today; he gets to play in the garden, harvest seeds and turn over compost.  I may make another batch of salsa, for the freezer this time, and some grape pie filling.  The squirrels are coming out in force: our yard is a major thoroughfare for them and we have several nests high up in some of our trees.  They are fun to watch.

Yesterday evening Quarta watched a particularly creepy episode of Dr. Who with us (with the Ood, a black hole, and Satan trying to break out of the pit, part 1).  Tertia was whimpering in her room, as far away from the TV as possible because she thought it had something to do with mummies, which is her current biggest fear... we are not allowed to say the "m-word."  So to recover, we played a round of Apples to Apples.  I had a moment of brilliance when I played "pigs" to match "radiant" -- remember Charlotte's Web? Literary allusions for the win!  But I didn't win.  Tertia had a lengthy fit of the giggles when Steve played "underwear" to match "cute."  It was pretty priceless, actually.  Secundus was at a reunion party for his kindergarten class, where they played Apples to Apples, too.

And as promised, a random (short) book review:

Indiscretions of Archie by P.G. Wodehouse was written early in Wodehouse's illustrious career, and it may not be the best introduction to the master, but it's certainly a fun stand-alone tale.  In it, Wodehouse honed his stock characters; irascible business tycoons, subtly underhanded butlers, and a vast array of feckless but amiable young men from all walks of life and both sides of the Atlantic.  One of them is the titular Archie, who, after de-enlisting from service in WWI, wanders off from Britain to America to seek his fortune.  He immediately wins the enmity of hotel magnate Daniel Brewster.  Then, a few weeks later, he shows up at Brewster's hotel again, newly married to Lucille, Brewster's only daughter.  The rest of the book is an episodic series of attempts to rectify matters, written as only Wodehouse could.

Book Review: The Rithmatist

The Rithmatist by Brandon Sanderson was recommended to me by my son Daniel, who loves nothing better than a multi-volume epic fantasy saga set in a complex and engrossing world.  Sanderson, famous for writing such tomes himself and even taking on the completion of epic fantasies begun by another author, simplifies his usual style in this book aimed at the Young Adult market.  Although it is the first in an intended series, it's easy to get into and quick to read if you're a distracted teen, mom, or teacher who has no time at the present for slow-moving epics.  I read it back in August but this is the first real book review I've done in awhile because, well, Pinterest has made it much more challenging to embed pins on one's blog and I have only just (maybe) figured it out.

Joel, the young hero, is an under-performing student whose one dream in life has already been crushed - he wanted to become a Rithmatist, a sort of wizard who engages in dueling by drawing chalk figures that come to life; but he missed his chance of being chosen at a mystical "inception" ceremony and is now too old, seemingly destined for a sub-par career and a life of poverty.  But all that changes when mysterious events at Armedius Academy transpire and Joel is thrown together with the Rithmatic students and professors.  He befriends Melody, a rather annoying girl who is underachieving for her own reasons, but has a knack for drawing chalkling unicorns.  Together they seek to find the cause of the attacks on students that are somehow linked to alarming events in the larger world -- the mysterious tower in Nebrask.

Like all recent YA fantasies, this book is obviously indebted to Harry Potter, but the "school story with a twist" actually reminded me more of the Pixar film Monsters University, with its overall lighthearted feel.  This is also a good introduction to the related genres of "steampunk" and alternate history.  Without being hackneyed or derivative, though: Sanderson has plenty of invention of his own.  The illustrations by Ben McSweeney contribute nicely to the feel of the book, and there is no objectionable material or disturbing violence.  Look closely and you may be able to detect echoes of some Mormon theology, perhaps.  I found it a bit odd to see the suggested discussion questions and book report project ideas at the back -- but Daniel assures me this is standard procedure these days.  I guess fantasy lit has come a long way if its authors now plan ahead for their books to be school assignments!  Back in my day, there was a bit of a stigma if you read this type of fiction.  I'm glad that's changed, but I'm not sure I'd kill the enjoyment of a book like this by turning it into an assignment.  A fun, different, refreshing read with potential for more enjoyment to come.

Randomday

Once again it's Randomday, when the blog eats leftovers and is happy to do it.

That awkward moment when Secundus, trying to back Dad's car out without hitting Grandma's, manages to wedge it between Grandma's car and the garage with less than an inch to spare in either direction.  He did, eventually, have to come back in the house and ask for help.  Neither car was damaged, but he was a little late to his job at the fair.  Now that the fair is over, he is plotting how best to spend his earnings, researching used pickup trucks.

Zucchini recipes here and here.  Surely you will find something to do with your zucchini.  You know you have them!  This is Quarta's blue-ribbon fair zucchini.

Speaking of the fair, here are my results and the judges' comments, clockwise from the top:

• Feathered star, red ribbon, "some quilting is not straight but I applaud you for doing it yourself."
• Mayan Spring shawl, blue ribbon, "nice tension. One end needs yarn worked back in, easy to do."
• Orca Bay quilt, red ribbon, "some points do not quite meet up and some are puckered. Nice use of scrap."
• Jack's Chain quilt, red ribbon, "some points don't quite match up.  Very nice binding.  Sweet retro quilt."
• Wingspan shawlette, blue ribbon, "very nice.  Keeps shoulders warm."
• Handspun BFL yarn, red ribbon, "Great color in yarn, nice twist - no info as to use and source of fiber."
• Argyle socks, blue ribbon, "very nice, lovely colors."

I have decided I will probably never win a blue ribbon on a quilt, if those three didn't qualify.  I tend to think my quilting skills are a little better than my knitting skills, especially when it comes to design and color choice, but the clothing department where I entered my knitting had more generous judges.  Oh well, it was still fun.

And a random book review: The Ionia Sanction, by Gary Corby.  This is the second book in a series of historical mysteries set in ancient Greece.  Nicolaos, (whose kid brother is a hilariously geeky Socrates), is called upon to pursue an investigation of the murder of a city official with ties to Ephesus.  He rescues a slave girl and travels to return her to her family, along the way reconnecting with his ex-girlfriend, the priestess Diotima, and the great general Themistocles, now a traitor to Greece and in the service of the Persians.  And though the book is meticulously well-researched, and the dialogue is witty and hip so as not to turn off the modern generation of readers, and the main characters are well-drawn and sympathetic, I can't recommend it wholeheartedly.  Graphic, sickening violence and gratuitous sexual situations are woven into the plot, making it a bit too disturbing, in my opinion, for the lighthearted tone the author is trying to create.  Definitely not for kids or sensitive adults, but a fascinating glimpse into history.

History is the record of an encounter between character and circumstances  

- Donald Creighton

WIP Wednesday and Yarn-Along

All by herself, Quarta came up with this design using some UFO blocks and patches that were in that big tub of scraps I got at the estate sale a few weeks ago:

(The tub itself is still sitting in the family room, waiting to be sorted through.  I just pulled out some obvious projects for her to work on and fabrics that she liked).

Yesterday she sewed them together.  I taught her how to make coping strips of some of the poppy fabric for the four hourglass blocks, which were about 1" smaller than the red and white ones.  For today's project, she baked and is frosting cut-out cookies.  I really wish I had one quarter of her energy.  My project today had to be something to clean the house, so I chose the linen closet upstairs.  Well, it's not really a closet because it has no door, and blankets and sleeping bags were spilling out into the hallway.  It was a small enough project I felt I could tackle it.

I found this old quilt, much loved and partly tattered, that Steve's grandmother pieced and his mom tied.  Daniel remembers the tattered spots fondly from when it was on his bed.

 There are some great vintage fabrics on these old string blocks!

I just couldn't resist bringing it out for a little photo op on the blog.  My own quilting has been limited lately, but I'm determined to finish seaming up the Country Stars quilt in the next few days.  Maybe now that my linen closet is clean and organized I can justify some play in the sewing room.

 I have been knitting a bit on my second Circle of Fun rug using lots of reclaimed cotton yarns.  And I read The Devil Wears Prada, which just happened to be on the staff picks shelf at the library.  I'd seen the movie and it was a fun read.  However, I think it's one of those rare instances where the movie is better than the original book.  I found Andrea, the first-person narrator, less sympathetic because of her constant snarkiness than Anne Hathaway's character in the movie.  The portrayal of the boss from hell who mistreats her employees and forces them to neglect their own personal and family lives is about the only plot point, so the book reads like a lengthy tabloid expose.  But I was irritated by Andrea's spineless, passive-aggressive response to her situation, and couldn't really sympathize with her much.  And last week, when I reviewed the latest Tom Clancy book, I put in a caution about language... well, this little book surprised me by dropping more F-bombs than that 800-pager.  Maybe New York girls really do talk like that, but it sure didn't make me like them, or the chick-lit they show up in.

This is how far I've gotten on Rosalind.  It's starting to be pretty, but there's a long way to go yet.  Linking up to WIP Wednesday and Yarn-Along.

Wednesday Updates and a Book Review

Keeping it busy and eclectic here at Carpe Lanam.  Yesterday, I carted some of my handwork from the past year to the Clark County fairgrounds to enter them in the fair:

Argyle socks, BFL spun during the Tour de Fleece, Ladyfern Wingspan (made from my handspun that won the Superintendent's prize in last year's fair!), Feathered Star, Orca bay, Mayan Spring, long shot of Orca Bay, and Jack's Chain.  Last year I had good success with the knitwear and handspun yarn entered in the "Clothing" division, and mediocre success with the quilts I entered.  I chose my quilts carefully this year and I'm cautiously optimistic I may get a blue ribbon on one.  But I don't know, the fair quilt ladies are kind of intimidating.  In a strict, grandmotherly kind of way.  I'm glad I have the blog as my main outlet.

My actual quilting and knitting in progress is at a summer crawl.  I am still working on seaming together the Country Stars quilt but not much farther along.  I am working on the Rosalind summer sweater and the Carnaby skirt and even a little on a many-strand cotton circle of fun rug, but without any new pictures.  The plum saga continues... I was up in the tree picking for quite some time today, I made pflaumenmus, and I expect to be pitting plums from the time I publish this until bedtime.

And now for something completely different:

*********************************************

Book review: Threat Vector by Tom Clancy

I suppose I am not a typical Tom Clancy fan.  But I've been reading his books since the mid '90s, and last week, before the plum onset, I tore through this latest offering in the Jack Ryan techno-thriller saga that began during the cold war with The Hunt for Red October.  Through a series of completely improbable and yet somehow believable (if you've stuck with the series thus far) events, Jack Ryan is now the sitting President of the U.S. and his son, Jack Jr., is involved in ultra-black-ops with "the Campus," an unofficial spy organization, set up by loyal Americans to do the things that the CIA and NSA should do, but can't.  And it's a good thing Jack Jr. and the Campus are on the job, because the U.S. is about to face its worst breach of security ever, and conventional intelligence forces are powerless to stop it.  The threat is cyber-terrorism at an unprecedented level by the statist communist regime in China; the vector by which it approaches is an unexpected but chillingly believable delivery system.  I guarantee you will view internet security in a whole new light after reading this book.

Clancy sets things up carefully and thoroughly.  We are well past page 300 before all major characters are introduced and the complex geo-political situation is fully fleshed out, and we have a clear picture of the villains.  But in no way is this a boring read.  My book light got lots of use as I stayed up late reading, and I thought even the highly technical descriptions of modern air and naval warfare were interesting.  Clancy excels at two things: the technical descriptions of military equipment, procedures, and tactics; and the narration of covert strategy in the intricate maneuvering of spy vs. spy.  He manages to make this interesting for a total civilian like me by having recurring characters deeply involved in the storylines, much more deeply involved than they would be in real life.  Since these characters are at risk, we want to know how they will get out of it, and we care enough to follow along through several hundred pages of technical and sometimes confusing action.  In this sense, it's just as well that his characters are not always three-dimensional.

Actually, Tom Clancy develops only one character: a manly man, a warrior who loves his country and his family equally and without conflict, who always knows the right course and is not afraid to follow it, and who has a cold, steely hatred for the enemies of his country.  Leave the navel-gazing moral equivocation to the characters of The West Wing; that's a liberal's fantasy government; Tom Clancy meets that need for the other half of the political spectrum.  At some point early in his writing career, he was doubtless told he needed to diversify his characters.  So he added Hispanic manly men, Black manly men, honorable and patriotic Russian manly men, and now Asian manly men.  He writes villains well, too: there are ruthless arch-villains like "Center," the man pulling the strings of the cyber-web of terror, and General Su Ke Qiang; and there are weak-willed stooges who are all too easily co-opted to serve them.  It's a bit like a medieval morality play as we watch the temptation and fall of these weak characters, or a Victorian melodrama; we know that the body count will be high by the end of the story, and the flawed characters will repent in dust and ashes.  And that's as it should be.  But the main point is the plot, and the unceasing, testosterone-driven action.

Reading Threat Vector in the aftermath of the NSA scandal and with a layman's understanding of the dangers of hacking, malware, and security breaches, I could appreciate Clancy's prescient insight into the dangers of his parallel universe, which is not all that different from our own.  Twelve years ago, Debt of Honor was in the spotlight as it described a modus operandi very similar to that used by the terrorists of 9/11.  All things considered, I would prefer not to have Threat Vector come true.  The vulnerabilities of the U.S. military and intelligence systems are becoming increasingly well-known; I hope someone somewhere in the Obama administration has picked up this book for some light summer reading and gives it some serious thought.

Caution: language, as always.  Clancy's characters have all apparently learned to swear from sailors, and that has been a constant through all his books.  After the first few pages I stopped noticing, but if it bothers you, it will be hard to ignore.

Yarning Along

I keep intending to be a more serious blogger in the summer.  It's not like I don't have serious thoughts, about Issues of the Day, Philosophy, Politics, History.  What do you do with your mind while your hands are busy, if not have serious thoughts?  But does anyone ever feel like writing it all down in the summer?  And if so, does anyone feel like reading it?  So I'm blogging with the bare basics of summer fun and may slip in a serious thought or two if the mood strikes.  The Tour de Fleece is first off.  Here is my lion mascot posing with the two skeins of finished yarn I plied yesterday.  About 550 yards of light fingering BFL 2-ply dyed by Frabjous Fibers in the "Atlantis" colorway.  I like the way the teals and copper and alabaster stayed remarkably distinct during the plying.

The Country Stars quilt is coming together since last week, but I have been lazy the last few days - this is the same as Monday's photo.  And I have still not put the Farmer's Wife quilt on the frame.  But I have decided to enter Jack's Chain, Orca Bay, and Feathered Star in the Clark County fair.  All were finished this last year, even if the tops were finished before that.  I'm pleased with the fact that my tops are sitting for a shorter time before machine quilting than before I started blogging.

I am not sure which of three knitting projects I want to commit to, so I split the photo for the yarn-along between two.  (There's also a pair of socks on the needles, but no photo of them yet because they are just toes.)  If I want to knit wool, there's the Carnaby skirt on the left.  And if I want nice soft cotton, it's Rosalind on the right in Green Tea Simply Cotton.

I just finished reading The Pericles Commission, first in a series of mystery novels set in ancient Athens by Gary Corby.  Nicolaos is the middle-class son of a sculptor, but he has ambitions beyond carrying on the family business -- ambitions that may be achievable when Ephialtes, the father of the newborn Athenian democracy, falls murdered at his feet and Pericles, his would-be successor, asks him to investigate the crime.  But politics in Athens is a dangerous business.  Nico is hindered as much as helped by a large cast of real historical characters, including Diotima, priestess of Artemis, and Nico's annoyingly insightful little brother, Socrates.  It's a lighthearted romp and the author does have a gift for bringing ancient history to life.  The cover art and writing style might convince you it's designed for the middle readers that Caroline Lawrence's Roman Mysteries series is aimed at, but no, this is definitely for adults.  I look forward to reading the other two books in the series as soon as I can get them from the library.

Book Review: Lives of the Twelve Caesars

Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose

It's a good summer to be reading Suetonius.  Disturbing, but reassuring in a way, to realize that the cultural disintegration we are experiencing here and now is nothing new.  American exceptionalism - maybe not so much.  We have made a wilderness, and we call it progress.

I read Tacitus several years ago, and appreciated his restrained yet biting style.  I'm sorry that many of the juicy parts were lost to history.  But although both of my sons have read Suetonius as part of their classical education, I had developed my 6th grade Roman history unit without it.  So in late spring I set out to remedy the situation.  In a sense, I have learned nothing that I didn't know already, and only filled out what I already knew from secondary sources with material which is almost entirely inappropriate for 6th grade.  You might want to grab your copy of Suetonius soon, before the cultural police decide he was too judgmental and bigoted to remain on the shelves.  We already know how they feel about the Bible and those who teach from it.

Suetonius is a bit more prone to repeat hearsay than Tacitus.  And it is a bit disconcerting for a modern reader who wants to see a psychological analysis of the depravity of the Caesars, some kind of explanation for their behavior - and it is not forthcoming.  But in matters of historic record he is careful to present a balanced and fair account, with not much personal feeling coloring his writing.  The ancient Romans were, as a whole, very tolerant of anything or anyone that could conceivably be of use to them.  This open-mindedness served them well as they were building their empire.  In fact, their great irony was that they were so tolerant, even of immorality, that they became intolerant of those who adhered to any basic morality.  And when absolute power was concentrated in one emperor (who expected to be treated as a god), the new intolerance could be directed toward quite unexpected victims.

In the world's way of looking at things, both Julius and Augustus Caesar were brilliant leaders, and they were both duly deified after their deaths.  Yet the arrogance and narcissism that became pathological in their successors was present in them as well.  Strangest to modern readers is the obsessive-compulsive way they arranged their own and their families' personal lives - even to the point of arranging divorces and remarriages, frequently against the consent of the parties involved.  Check out the family tree of the Julio-Claudian emperors for just a taste of the weirdness, but prepare for a confusing time.  Ironically, with all the attention Augustus gave to micromanaging his family, he was remarkably shortsighted when it came to preparing a successor.

Source: accla.org via Katherine on Pinterest

Think Paula Deen got a raw deal?  The emperor Tiberius was so sensitive to imaginary insults that he banished a Greek leader, Xeno, for speaking a dialect that reminded him of an unhappy time in his life.  He forced Seleucus, a scholar, to commit suicide because he was too well-informed about the literature Tiberius was reading.  Of course, Tiberius was perverted as well as being cruel and, hmm, maybe you could say "capricious" if you wanted to make a bad pun.  So many Romans were killed without cause during his reign that no one thought of deifying him when he finally died.

Source: google.co.uk via Katherine on Pinterest

Caligula - even Suetonius calls him a monster.  Probably the less said about him, the better.  His attempts to define as normal whatever he wanted to do were not accepted by the people, and were ultimately not successful.  There is no denying that human life was not valued highly in ancient times, and that common decency was hard to come by.  But then you read a story like this one and wonder whether we should really feel superior at all.  Or when a shrieking mob of activists is so devoted to the killing of late-term babies that they shout down a Texas bill preventing abortion when a child is capable of feeling pain.

Source: Uploaded by user via Katherine on Pinterest

I always felt sorry for emperor Claudius.  Awkward and weak, he was despised by his own family members and was never expected to amount to anything - so he wasn't prepared to be a leader.  It's hardly surprising that he was not a capable leader, and that his great weakness of falling for inappropriate women led to his downfall.

Source: 2.bp.blogspot.com via Katherine on Pinterest

The first recorded account of gay marriage was by the emperor Nero.  Oddly enough, this is not something that makes it into the current press coverage, but I'll quote from Suetonius, p. 228, right after Nero raped the Vestal Virgin Rubria:

"Having tried to turn the boy Sporus into a girl by castration, he went through a wedding ceremony with him -- dowry, bridal veil and all -- took him to his palace with a great crowd in attendance, and treated him as a wife.  A rather amusing joke is still going the rounds: the world would have been a happier place had Nero's father Domitius married that sort of wife."

There follows a paragraph describing Nero's most likely incestuous relationship with his mother Agrippina, and then another gay wedding, this time with Nero playing the bride.  So much for the "committed, loving" relationships we keep hearing about as the gay agenda is imposed on modern America: the second time was with Doryphorus, not Sporus.  It would have been amusing, if it had not been accompanied by so much wanton cruelty.  Nero was responsible for killing an obscene number of human beings who crossed him, including most of his family members.  The word "unnatural" does come to mind.  One can only imagine what might have happened to the poor florist who refused to provide flowers for his gay wedding.

I wonder, will future generations look with the same freak-show amusement at modern America that we have when we read about the decadence of the Ancient Romans?  Bottom line, what I get from Suetonius is, the ancient decadent Roman emperors practiced perversity and the cruel slaughter of innocent people, but even the pagan historians still viewed their behavior as unnatural and depraved.  Human cultures do not turn around on a dime (or a sestertius), and trying to force people to accept what they know at a very deep level to be wrong will not be successful.

WIP Wednesday and Yarn-Along

I just took the Cedar Tree auction quilt off of the Megaquilter.  Now to get it bound and signed over to the auction folks.

I should probably put a hanging sleeve on too.  I don't know what quilting or sewing project I want to do next.  It's kind of a nice place to be.

Reading Real Education by Charles Murray, and not making a lot of progress on the Farmer McGregor socks.  I haven't really felt like knitting lately.  More precisely, I haven't felt very motivated to knit socks lately.

Real Education makes four arguments that are rather controversial in today's educational climate:

1. Ability varies.
2. Half of the children are below average.
3. Too many people are going to college.
4. America's future depends on how we educate the academically gifted.

Plenty of challenging stuff in there.  As a teacher and as a mom of a special needs child, I can really sympathize with the argument that we can't realistically demand "no child left behind."  And I can certainly sympathize with the despair of trying to educate someone who doesn't have the ability to understand the subject.

Book Review: Mockingjay

Source: images.search.yahoo.com via Katherine on Pinterest

I've done book reviews of the first two books of the Hunger Games trilogy for the last few weeks, and it's time to wrap it up with Mockingjay, the final book in the bestselling series.  Click on the links to read the previous review of The Hunger Games and Catching Fire.  I will attempt to review the third book without giving any spoilers for that book, but I'll be referring to events of the previous two books in this review, so if you haven't read the books yet and hate spoilers, be forewarned.

******************************************


Panem's teenage heroine Katniss Everdeen is back again, a damaged soul after not one but two forays into the deadly arena of the Hunger Games.  This time, her defiance of the unwritten rules by which the Capitol keeps its subjects in line has caused a terrible retribution to fall on the citizens of District Twelve, her former home.  President Snow shows a creepy and altogether too personal animosity toward her.  Worst of all, her fellow combatant Peeta, one of the few morally centered characters in the books, has been captured by the Capitol and is presumably being tortured and brainwashed in an attempt to manipulate her.  Because Katniss has come to be the Mockingjay, the symbol of resistance against tyranny that may be the only thing able to motivate and inspire the freedom fighters in this post-apocalyptic world to rise up and overthrow their oppressors.  And it is most definitely a case of either kill or be killed, but on a much larger scale than we've seen previously.

Action centers in District Thirteen, previously thought to be utterly destroyed.  But in reality, an insurgency has been building itself there for several years, and its leaders desperately want Katniss to work for them.  Katniss spends much time fighting the call to be the Mockingjay.  She is very obviously suffering from post-combat psychological disorders, and the forms warfare takes in this distant future setting are not pleasant.  Her new allies are sympathetic, but Katniss is a soldier now and is expected to act like one. There is also the love triangle; Katniss, whether she wants to admit it or not, is torn between Peeta, the boy with the bread who loves her and has shown himself willing to die for her on multiple occasions, and Gale, the spirited hunting partner of her younger years, with whom she unquestionably has more in common.  And the danger: the very real possibility that none of the principal characters might survive the book.  Katniss is, at points in the story, so haunted by grief that she becomes passive.  There are no moral authorities in this book; and there is more than a little of the postmodern idea that all forms of government are equally corrupt.

If you've read my previous two reviews, you know I have mixed feelings about this series.  The anti-war message is all very well, but the first-person, present tense narration tends to make the action feel too close, too immediate.  I think of it as the literary equivalent of a first-person shooter game.  By no means is the violence glorified, but I have to wonder if a better way to create social consciousness and anti-war sentiment in young people might not be to make a few documentaries about real-world senseless violence and play some old Peter, Paul, and Mary albums.  Still, it was the most believable for me of the three books, largely because it focused on the larger world outside the arena.  When I was reading the first book particularly, I was desperate to see the whole world in context; this is where we get that information, and it is satisfying.

The depraved violence makes it a disturbing read for adults and older teens; I personally can't recommend it for younger children.  But it is a haunting story that will stay with you, and the ending is not as utterly bleak as I was afraid of.  Okay, so that's not entirely high praise.  It's a postmodern book.  It will have to do.

Book Review: Catching Fire (Hunger Games 2)

I'm finding that as my student load approaches 50, I'm more and more stressed by the end-of-quarter grading rush.  For some reason it took me all of Thursday, Friday, and most of Saturday to tackle the final exams and reading worksheets, and I'm by no means done with final grades yet.  This translates into zero time to do things that I actually set the blog up to talk about: quilting and knitting.  So no pretty pictures to share, either.  Instead, I've decided to continue my book reviews of the Hunger Games trilogy.

Source: google.com via Katherine on Pinterest

I’ve already reviewed the first book in the Hunger Games trilogy here.  Today I want to tackle the second, Catching Fire, by Suzanne Collins.  I will do my best not to give any spoilers for the 2^nd or 3^rd books in this review, but I will freely refer to events of the 1^st book, so if you have not read it yet you may want to skip this post.

As the second book opens, Katniss Everdeen, the first-person protagonist, has secured a position for herself and co-champion Peeta that is nearly unheard of in the benighted history of District Twelve.  Only once before has a champion emerged from Twelve, and he is Haymitch, the town drunk.  But the shadowy totalitarian rulers at the Capitol, personified by the creepy and all-too-personal President Snow, will not let Katniss and Peeta live in comfortable luxury.  Their victory in last year's games was won by threatening a double-suicide, thereby cheating the public out of their entertainment and somehow posing a threat to the stability of the Capitol.

Katniss and Peeta go on a victory tour and see rumblings of political unrest throughout the districts they tour, as well as the ruthless hand of the government in suppressing any dissent.  They must act as if they are in love, or reprisals will undoubtedly fall on their families and friends.  As champions they are expected to train and advise the next year's champions, but this is a special anniversary year, the 75th since the beginning of the Hunger Games, and it is announced that this year's contestants will be drawn from the winners of previous years.  Think of it as the "all-star" version of your favorite reality show, but to the death.  So the central conflict of this book involves another entry into the arena, forced combat in front of a command audience, and kill-or-be-killed situations.

Now, I freely admit that I am not a major consumer of dystopian or Young Adult fiction, and especially not of the combination of the two genres.  However, I have a fair amount of familiarity with the ancient Romans, and some with the realm of politics, and Catching Fire does not create a completely believable story on either point.  Juvenal's famous quote, "panem et circenses" may have given the Capitol its name and provided inspiration for creating a fascinating fantasy world, but it was in actuality more of an indictment against the Roman people, as you can see in translation:

Already long ago, from when we sold our vote to no man, the People have abdicated our duties; for the People who once upon a time handed out military command, high civil office, legions — everything, now restrains itself and anxiously hopes for just two things: bread and circuses.

In other words, you can't be manipulated unless you let yourself be manipulated.  I would have been more patient with the story if the Capitol had been Roman in more than name: but these effete narcissists would have been wiped off the map by real Romans, or even real barbarians.  I found it impossible to believe that the same culture that took such an avid interest in voting on Katniss' wedding gowns would also have the military savvy and stamina to terrorize the populace so absolutely, even to the point of hidden cameras, genetically engineered torture, and mind control.  The Romans may have had their decadent elements, but they were much more straightforward than that, and they respected courage and leadership in any form they saw it.

However, this book did much more than the first in the series to fill in the gaps in the fictional world of Panem that were troubling me.  We understand a little more of the structure of the country and the seething resentment that must inevitably bubble to the surface.  But I am still troubled by the cross-genre nature of the book itself.  It seems counterintuitive to write an anti-war book condemning the over-reliance on popular culture and violent entertainment, while at the same time coopting your readers into the very manipulative, violent entertainment you are ostensibly condemning.  And that's what happens to us -- remember, first-person narrator in the present tense means that we are connected to Katniss' thoughts with an intimacy and immediacy that could be compared to the "teaser" interviews that contestants give in our reality TV programming.  There is no time to think ahead or live in anything more than the moment.  When we do reflect on what we've read, we realize that other than the enforced intimacy, we don't really like Katniss as a heroine.  She's tough and gutsy, yes.  Quick with a snarky comment, she's honest in the midst of an artificial world and you want to like her.  But when the action is thickest, she tends to be rather passive, letting others make the important calls and retreating into her personal angst after just enough decisive action to advance the plot to the next point of crisis.  At the very end of Catching Fire, the final plot revelation/cliffhanger comes so abruptly that it's disorienting... leaving you, of course, with a compelling need to read the third book, whether you like Katniss or not.

It makes for gripping, page-turning reading, suitable for older teens with enough maturity not to be depressed by the heavy theme.  Or younger teens who will be oblivious to the heavy theme and enjoy it as a violent action/thriller.