Unlikely Destinations by Tony and Maureen Wheeler

The Lonely Planet books over the years have been our guide posts, starting with our trip around the world 27 years ago. We used to joke about the gringo trail of people who would go eat oatmeal in Penang where Tony ate oatmeal. Aside from our snarky comments, the Wheeler books provided a fresh way to look at traveling for young people shouldering back packs and looking for cheap and interesting travels to unique places. So our traveling grew up with the Wheelers. Alas, the book is a bit of a plodder. Nonetheless it was worth a skim to read how long it took them to turn a profit, the challenges they had with each other and raising their traveling kids. I would have liked to hear more about their adventures traveling than the type of computers they bought as the business expanded. They are giving back with their foundation to the people in countries where they have travelled. A nice touch!

The Earthsea Wizard by Ursula Le Guin

This was my second time reading this book. Ursula Le Guin was coming to read from it at our community center. I realized all of a sudden that this was the book that J.K Rowling had used as a model for her Harry Potter books. It is about a boy wizard who has no mother and goes off to wizard school where he unleases a shadow (in his youthful pride to show how powerful he is to a rival) that haunts and taunts him through out the book. Ursula Le Guin's reading was wonderful. She is a tiny 78 year old person. She wanted to write about a boy wizard "Ged" because growing up she only read about old men with flowing white beards. Ged's good friend Vetch from school helps him on his journey and Ged spends time at Vetch's house and quite likes his sister (sound familiar?) In the end after going from island to island, conquering a few dragons, and venturing out to sea where none has ever gone, Ged conquers the shadow and good once again triumphs over evil. This is a pretty simple story but nicely written with many sequels, which I have not read. Le Guin makes all her characters in this book dark skinned. The Earthsea world is full of islands with funny names. Names are important to Le Guin who makes them up and only uses them if they feel right. Le Guin says it was not until the fourth book in this series that she found her feminist perspective and stopped trying to be a man writer. It was very touching to see many of the audience members tell her how deeply influenced they had been by her books. I hate to think of books disappearing from our interior lives!

The Professor and the Madman by Simon Winchester

This books tells the true story of Dr Minor (a Yale graduate, civil war solider, doctor, and a murderer) who resides in an insane asylum in England and reads through many thousands of English literature books to help write word definitions for the Oxford English Dictionary. If he had been alive today, his condition, paranoid dementia, would have been treated by medication today and perhaps if he had had such medication he would never have found the solace he did in writing all those thousands of word definitions. The book is written with each chapter starting with a word such as Sesquipedalian - adjective of words and expressions that have many syllables. I liked learning about how this first comprehensive dictionary was written- it took 70 years and the fact it relied on many volunteers- sort of a wikipedia project. I had not thought that Shakespeare did not have access to a comprehensive dictionary in his time. An interesting book although the style made it a little hard to read!

The Glass Castle by Jeanette Walls

When you read this book about Jeannette Walls and her crazy family, you wonder -- is this really true? Her parents were vagabonds and dreamers who certainly would not know the meaning of the words helicopter parent. They drag their four children through a careless, almost abusive childhood. The kids have to fend for themselves to find food. They rarely have baths or clean clothes. And yet there is something occasionally magical that happens such as when Jeanette's dad takes her out on the stoop of their house on Christmas Eve to give her any star she wants and name it after her as a present or when she goes to Barnard on her own and he and her mother are homeless in NYC - he wins $1000 at poker and gives it to her to pay the last $1000 she owes for college.

Infidel by Ayaan Hirsi Ali

Ayaan Hirsi Ali, is a Somalian woman who seeks refuge in the Netherlands from her harsh life as a Muslim woman in Africa, and eventually becomes a member of the Dutch parliament. After reading this book I had to ask myself would I really be this brave and willing to risk my life for speaking out against the way Islamic women are treated in Africa? I hope so, but it would not be easy. Ayaan grows up with a mother who beats her and a father (anti Somalian government activist) who is rarely present in her life. At age five she learns to recite her ancestors 300 years back. Knowing their names will make you strong says her Grandmother. Life for a young girl and woman in an African Islamic household is full of submissions, whippings and covering up your body. Ayaan moves with her mother, grandmother, brother and sister between Somalia, Saudi Arabia, Ethiopia, and Kenya. She is luckier than many girls because she gets to go to school and her father (though rarely present) loves her very much. She flees an arranged marriage and seeks asylum in the Netherlands. She is disowned by her family for her dishonor. Her father refers to her as deceitful fox. After experiencing the freedom of life in Holland, Ayaan becomes an outspoken advocate for the rights of women who like herself grew up in repressed Muslim families. This leads to a film called Suppression which she produces with Theo Van Gogh which describes a woman veiled who must submit to the way of Islam and then uncovered with Koran writings on her body. Theo is murdered and Ayaan is subjected to death threats and under protection from the Dutch government. I found myself agreeing with her that the Dutch had gone too far in providing funding for separate religious schools and community centers for the Muslim immigrants in their country. Many immigrants do not become fully integrated into the Dutch society and they continue to beat their women and live their lives as they would in Africa on the generous public welfare system. Eeks I am sounding like a conservative, but I do think there are some lessons to be learned here about how immigrants need to be encouraged to adopt the values of the country they choose to live in. I really enjoyed the fast pace and amazing story Ayaan shares about her life in this book.

Alice Waters Chez Panisse by Thomas McNamee

I can't believe I am reading another foodie book. Really I am NOT a foodie. But I was curious about Alice Waters as her restaurant in California spawned the locavore movement in the U.S. Alice loves food, cooking and men. The restaurant business requires hours of time and the complicated meals she prepares exhausted me. She has some interesting boy friends and friends. I would love to go to one of her dinner parties at Chez Panisse. Her initial dream of a restaurant where neighbors come to eat and socialize, mushrooms (no pun intended) into a mecca for foodies thus displacing the neighborhood feel. Alice struggles most of the time to turn a profit. I would like to be her daughter, Fanny, and have delicious school lunches packed for me (I had cream cheese and jelly sandwiches every day for 10 years).  I skimmed a lot of this book but appreciated reading how dedicated someone can be to a passion they have...similar to Greg Mortenson. I am looking forward to our weekly produce box from our local farmers Annie and Sue coming soon!

Attachment by Isabel Fonesca

This book got a lot of hype in the NY Times book review. I just had to read it as it seemed about a woman about my age. Alas it was a bit of a disappointment- the story of Jean, an American married to a Brit, who suspects her husband is having an affair. They live on an island in the Indian Ocean but seem to bounce around from London to NY with ease. I read Isabel's earlier book  Bury Me Standing about gypsies, which was non fiction and interesting. While I liked her writing style in this book and the twists at the end, the story jumped around too much for me. I would not recommend this book.