book reviews second quarter 2008

Married life has certainly ushered in different rhythm of life. I was hoping that with no wedding to plan anymore, I’d have more time to read, but other things (of the nature of arts and crafts, cooking and household chores) have filled that space. That being said, I am quite glad that wedding and honeymoon planning is done and over with—everything except photos and thank you notes that is. And I’m hoping to continue to make more time to read over the next little while, especially as I may be taking a class at Penn this fall, and may no longer have the luxury of reading whatever I feel like reading.

In any case, of late, I’ve been digging my elbows deep in sociology and urban studies non-fiction (prompted perhaps by Planet of the Slums and Bowling Alone), but I think I may spend the summer months with a bit more fiction. Next on the list: The Road by Cormac McCarthy, and perhaps C.S. Lewis’ Space Trilogy. Reviews are also posted on Goodreads.com.

Fiction

*** The Watchmen (Alan Moore)
Heralded as one of the best graphic novels ever, The Watchmen is a very intense and dark story of the lives of former costumed vigilantes (superheroes without superpowers). It begins with the investigation into the mysterious murder of one of them. It’s extremely well-written and well-told, but requires quite a bit of thought and attention to follow along. I won’t say too much, but I will say that the Watchmen defies the genre, by being an anti-superhero story.

** Straight Man (Richard Russo)
This book recounts a week in the life of a professor of English in Railton, Pennsylvania. It is focused on the drama of his department, the university (facing extreme budget cuts), and his family. The book is meant to be humorous, and succeeds most of the time, though sometimes the events end up being a bit absurd. It was decently/mildly entertaining to read, especially as it mocks academic culture. Summed up, the book is about: “Only after we’ve done a thing do we know what we’ll do, and by then whatever we’ve done has already begun to sever itself from clear significance, at least for the doer.” It’s nothing life changing but if you’re looking for a light, quick, funny read, and you have a soft spot for the university, this might work out well.

*** Housekeeping (Marilynne Robinson)
This is a beautifully written novel about two sisters coping with the death (apparent suicide) of their mother in the small town of Fingerbone. The prose reads like poetry and the quiet, somber, dreamy reflections on life and death weave their way into the narrative. However, that very reverie-like prose made it difficult to connect more deeply with the characters—they seemed like beautiful ghostly abstractions rather than real flesh and blood individuals (but I suspect that may be the author’s intentions). In any case, it was enjoyable to read, and perhaps can be very inspiring to an aspiring writer.

Non-Fiction

*** Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community (Robert Putnam)
This book summarizes substantial amounts of empirical studies on American community, which is broadly defined to include civic engagement, participation in different interest groups, church attendance, philanthropic giving, volunteering, or simply hanging out with friends. After Putnam clearly demonstrates the decline of American community since the 1950s, he spends a good portion of time investigating the various factors that may have caused it, including suburban sprawl, television, less free time, generational change etc… He spends the last few chapters on a hopeful note, mentioning the spurt in community involvement after the growing injustices of the late 1800s.
Though he didn’t leave me entirely convinced, Putnam posits a series of societal changes that could have substantial impact on community involvement, ones that are very well in the realm of possibility. Putnam does spend quite a bit of time detailing methodology, but overall the book is not technically bogged down. My favourite chapter was probably the one detailing the detrimental effects of television.

*** The Sabbath (Abraham Heschel)
Heschel is a Jewish theologian and this short book is his reflection on the role of Sabbath in Jewish religious life. The Sabbath is a day of holiness, a palace of time, a way to commune with God. While I found most of this book less applicable to me as a Christian (though it did help me start to understand better Jewish culture), the first two chapters and the last one are absolutely phenomenal. In these chapters, Heschel reflects on society’s tendency to devalue time, which it cannot so easily control, in order to acquire more of space, that which seems so much easier to possess.

**** Final Exam: A Surgeon’s Reflections on Mortality (Pauline Chen)
This is a beautifully written book by a surgeon. Chen recounts her training and her practice as a doctor, narrating the ways in which she and her fellow medical students or doctors confronted or avoided confronting death. While Chen touches upon policy-oriented issues, such as the need for palliative care, better M & M conferences, better medical training, her book reads best as a memoir of her own personal and emotional struggles. I found most moving Chen’s narrations of how she responded to a husband or a wife dying to a chronic disease, while his or her partner watched and waited. Chen writes both vividly and compassionately. This book touched me more personally than most, perhaps as I have been reflecting more on how hard it would be to lose my husband (or for him to lose me) after the recent death to cancer of a church member with a husband and young children.

**** The Death and Life of Great American Cities (Jane Jacobs)
Written in the 1960’s, Jane Jacobs revolutionized the way we viewed and studied the city. She summarizes her approach in her final chapter—cities are not to be studied as objects of simplicity (e.g. simple relationships, more open space = better neighborhoods), nor objects of disorganized complexity (e.g. statistical approaches), but are to be treated as a living organism—incredibly complex yet organized and interrelated. She advocates the “microscopic” approach to looking at the city—digging in very deeply, instead of relying on high flying theories. She concludes that the success of a city is not dependent on any single component (e.g. open space, broken windows, etc…), but on a complex interaction of various factors, which she outlines in her book.
However, for most of the book though, Jacobs rarely talks to high-brow metaphor, but remains incredibly practical, concrete, realistic and easy to understand. She relies heavily on examples from Boston, New York, Philadelphia and Chicago. She focuses on several elements that in combined, including mixed and diverse uses (e.g. commercial and residential areas mixed together), shorter blocks, ideal density and lack of large borderlands/abandoned spaces (which can be parks!), and diversity. Her book was long to read, but definitely provided me with a new framework with which to observe and understand the city.

***** Sociological Imagination (C. Wright Mills)
The first 100 pages of this book were really hard to get through, and even after that, the book was very dense and took quite a bit of effort to understand. All that being said, this has been one of the most thought-provoking and academically-inspiring books I have read in the past year. Mills was a prominent sociologist of the earlier half of the twentieth century (if I’m not mistaken, he coined the phrases “WASP” and “white collar”).
In this book, Mills criticizes the two dominant methods of studying sociology (grand theory and abstracted empiricism), and then goes on to delineate the sociological imagination—a way of studying society that factors in historical, political and individual factors, that does not get too lofty with grandiose theories and abstractions nor too mired in the numbers and statistics of abstracted empiricism. He then writes about the need for the sociological imagination in today’s society, in relation to our reason and freedom, our democracy and politics. The appendix provides some guidance on how to conduct such research. Though Mill had a few touches of elitism to him, it was so refreshing to read someone who had a vision for social sciences (and for the academy) that mandates relevance to society at large and the individual.
To summarize his stance on the subject: “Our public life now often rests upon such official definitions, as well as upon myths and lies and crackbrained notions. When many politics- debated and undebated – are based on inadequate and misleading definitions of reality, then those who are out to define reality more adequately are bound to be upsetting influences. … Such is the role of mind, of study, of intellect, of reason, of ideas: to define reality adequately and in a publicly relevant way. The educational and the political role of social science in a democracy is to help cultivate and sustain public and individuals that are able to develop, to live with, and to act upon adequate definitions of personal and social realities.”

Rating scale
* didn’t like it
** it was ok
*** liked it
**** really liked it
***** it was amazing