Robin Sloan has created a novel that is about baking bread, physics, computer robotics all mixed up in a bowl that keeps the reader trying to figure out what the message of the story is.
Lois Clary is a software programmer, who lives in San Francisco and codes all day and collapses at night from her new job. She has no social life and very little human interaction. She does not know how to cook for herself and is subsisting on Slurry, a whole processed nutrition drink. Lois explains to the reader early on, "Let me just establish where I was at with the whole cooking situation. When I was a child my family had no distinguishable cuisine. ...We possessed no stock of recipes, no traditions, no ancestral affinities. There was a lot of migration and drama in our history; our line had been broken not once but many times, like one of those gruesome accident reports, the bone shattered in six places. When they put my family back together, they left out the food."
One day a menu randomly placed on her doorstep leads her to start ordering from Clement Street Soup and Sourdough. A spicy soup and sourdough bread that is delivered on a regular basis starts to make Lois feel better than she has in months. When the brothers who run the food service leave the country due to Visa issues, they leave Lois with the sourdough bread starter. She must keep it alive. This is a task that starts to become an obsession with Lois. She is now baking bread and coding around the clock. She is challenged to combine her two expert interests; coding a robotic arm to learn to bake.
This is where this reader kept looking for the message. I was assuming that the lesson I would learn in the end was that human interaction is the most important. That letting robots take over jobs that people do is wrong and will turn out badly in the end. That there is no replacement for the loving touch of human hands on our food. Throughout the book there are ups and downs of the ability of the robotic arm to be useful in the kitchen, but I am not sure Sloan leaves us with the don't do it message. Also there is the continued search for a nutritional supplement that you can eat that gives you all your nutrition without eating food. Is man sustainable without his human diet? That was also a theme throughout the book that explored and hopefully shown to be unsustainable.
An interesting plot line idea that bubbles in a crock like sourdough starter, but collapses when baked and taken out of the oven in the end.
Friday, December 29, 2017
Friday, December 22, 2017
The Necklace
What a wonderful story for a snow day! With hot cocoa and a warm blanket, you can sit back and caught up in the Quincy family's drama. Great Aunt Lou Lou has passed away and left the next generation to divide up the house, jewelry and household items. Of course there is a family scandal that has been swept under the carpet all these years that will be exposed when the dust clears. There will also be romance and a tug of war with a priceless necklace.
Claire McMillan has created a wonderful picture of the Quincy family, trying to hold onto the old world charm that surrounded their family, when there were weekend house parties and people had servants who brought around champagne while guests played lawn tennis and croquet.
It is 2009 and Nell Quincy Merrihew comes back to the ancestral home of the Quincy family after many years. Her mother left for good, years ago, married and with their child Nell had always lived in Oregon far from the family home. Summer visits, Nell remembers with her cousins, Pansy and Emerson, where when she tried to fit in. Now they are going to hear the reading of Lou Lou's will.
When the the will is read and Nell is named executor of the estate and given a necklace as her inheritance everyone wonders at the sanity of Lou Lou at the end of her life. But as the story unravels with a look back in history of Lou Lou and her brothers growing up, we see how history long covered up is being exposed and Lou Lou is finally trying to right some wrongs.
Ambrose, Ethan and Lou Lou were young adults in the early 1920s. May is the girl of Ambrose's dreams, but it seems Ethan also has his eye on her. Ambrose had a traveling spirit that could not be contained. He goes off and travels the world to come home to so many changes. Ambrose needs to travel even though it means leaving the woman he loves behind. He is not willing to commit tot marriage or give up his world trip. May isn't willing to take any chances, traveling unmarried with Ambrose or promise to wait for him.
This is a story of lost opportunities and chances taken and missed. The story of love declared too late. But also the story of finding out that sometimes feeling the outsider is not always what it seems. There are family secrets that continue to affect family relationships for generations.
Claire McMillan has created a wonderful picture of the Quincy family, trying to hold onto the old world charm that surrounded their family, when there were weekend house parties and people had servants who brought around champagne while guests played lawn tennis and croquet.
It is 2009 and Nell Quincy Merrihew comes back to the ancestral home of the Quincy family after many years. Her mother left for good, years ago, married and with their child Nell had always lived in Oregon far from the family home. Summer visits, Nell remembers with her cousins, Pansy and Emerson, where when she tried to fit in. Now they are going to hear the reading of Lou Lou's will.
When the the will is read and Nell is named executor of the estate and given a necklace as her inheritance everyone wonders at the sanity of Lou Lou at the end of her life. But as the story unravels with a look back in history of Lou Lou and her brothers growing up, we see how history long covered up is being exposed and Lou Lou is finally trying to right some wrongs.
Ambrose, Ethan and Lou Lou were young adults in the early 1920s. May is the girl of Ambrose's dreams, but it seems Ethan also has his eye on her. Ambrose had a traveling spirit that could not be contained. He goes off and travels the world to come home to so many changes. Ambrose needs to travel even though it means leaving the woman he loves behind. He is not willing to commit tot marriage or give up his world trip. May isn't willing to take any chances, traveling unmarried with Ambrose or promise to wait for him.
This is a story of lost opportunities and chances taken and missed. The story of love declared too late. But also the story of finding out that sometimes feeling the outsider is not always what it seems. There are family secrets that continue to affect family relationships for generations.
Sunday, December 17, 2017
The Prague Sonata
Bradford Morrow has written a beautiful symphony of words that crescendo in the final movement of this novel. An historical novel of life in Czechoslovakia as Hitler brings World War II to their doorstep and modern day Czechoslovakia and the Unites States as the protagonist, Meta Taverner tries to bring together the individual movements of an ancient sonata, that were separated by the war and presumed lost with the people who carried them.
As one of the subjects who is searching for the parts of the musical manuscript describes it, "A brother and a sister living in Josefov, neither of them particularly compos mentis, survivors from the Nazi occupation days, had made noises about an early sonata manuscript, divvied up into three parts as Caesar divided Gaul." This novel takes the reader across time periods and oceans as the suspense builds through both the historical stories of the survivors of the two great wars and the travels that Meta and her colleagues take to try and find the owners of the music and hear the stories from the protectors of the music.
The story starts during World War One when as a young girl Otylie's father is leaving her after they have buried her mother. Otylie is nine years old when her father leaves her with a musical manuscript that he says will bring her a fortune in the future. He leaves her with the words that, "all wars begin with music". She grows up wanting to put music behind her and working hard just to live from day to day during WWII.
Now in current day New York, Meta meets Irena, who at 80 years old is looking to pass on the burden of holding onto a music manuscript that needs to be reunited with its original owner. Meta a twenty something music student is looking for something that will ignite her passion. In the course of trying to find out who wrote the original score and find its rightful owner, she has found her own desire to explore Europe and find love.
Morrow has used so many wonderful musical phrases in this novel, one example being his way of describing love as a duet, "A duet that wanted to evolve into a fugue. One whose harmonic and rhythmic structures moved toward the resolution."
So wonderfully written that even though this is a narrative that I have read before about a lost object music or artwork from the Holocaust that people in current day are searching for, it was gripping and even so lovely at the end that I was brought to a few tears.
As one of the subjects who is searching for the parts of the musical manuscript describes it, "A brother and a sister living in Josefov, neither of them particularly compos mentis, survivors from the Nazi occupation days, had made noises about an early sonata manuscript, divvied up into three parts as Caesar divided Gaul." This novel takes the reader across time periods and oceans as the suspense builds through both the historical stories of the survivors of the two great wars and the travels that Meta and her colleagues take to try and find the owners of the music and hear the stories from the protectors of the music.
The story starts during World War One when as a young girl Otylie's father is leaving her after they have buried her mother. Otylie is nine years old when her father leaves her with a musical manuscript that he says will bring her a fortune in the future. He leaves her with the words that, "all wars begin with music". She grows up wanting to put music behind her and working hard just to live from day to day during WWII.
Now in current day New York, Meta meets Irena, who at 80 years old is looking to pass on the burden of holding onto a music manuscript that needs to be reunited with its original owner. Meta a twenty something music student is looking for something that will ignite her passion. In the course of trying to find out who wrote the original score and find its rightful owner, she has found her own desire to explore Europe and find love.
Morrow has used so many wonderful musical phrases in this novel, one example being his way of describing love as a duet, "A duet that wanted to evolve into a fugue. One whose harmonic and rhythmic structures moved toward the resolution."
So wonderfully written that even though this is a narrative that I have read before about a lost object music or artwork from the Holocaust that people in current day are searching for, it was gripping and even so lovely at the end that I was brought to a few tears.
Tuesday, December 12, 2017
The Best of Adam Sharp
The Best of Adam Sharp written by Graeme Simsion is an intriguing novel. He leads the reader along down a winding path back through the life of Adam Sharp as he looks back on his younger days and wonders if he missed out on the love of his life and how his life would have been different if he had made a different choice back in his 20s.
Ever wonder what happened to your first love? What your life might have been like or where you would be now if you had married them? Sometimes lovers who left each other in high school and went onto other relationships and lives meet up again after their spouses have passed and they are both single again in later life. They pick up their friendship and sometimes their love affair again in old age. Would you still be attracted to that person who looked so good to you when you were 20 now that you are 70 or 80?
Adam at age 26 leaves England for a job opportunity in Melbourne, Australia. He is only there for a short contract job. After work in the evening he likes to go to the local bar and play the piano. One night the strong willed and alluring actress, Angelina Brown walks into the bar and sparks fly. She is married but astranged from her husband at the time and passion fills the air. They have a chance at something bigger, but Adam doesn't take it.
He goes back home and sets up housekeeping with Claire and decides he is happy with the life they have created. Until a post on his computer brings him back to an earlier forgotten time. Should Adam live dangerously and explore the option of rekindling this old romance? Is it worth risking the life you have for a chance at the unknown?
This is a novel that pulls the reader in. going along quite innocuously and then building suspense as Adam tries to sort out his life.
Ever wonder what happened to your first love? What your life might have been like or where you would be now if you had married them? Sometimes lovers who left each other in high school and went onto other relationships and lives meet up again after their spouses have passed and they are both single again in later life. They pick up their friendship and sometimes their love affair again in old age. Would you still be attracted to that person who looked so good to you when you were 20 now that you are 70 or 80?
Adam at age 26 leaves England for a job opportunity in Melbourne, Australia. He is only there for a short contract job. After work in the evening he likes to go to the local bar and play the piano. One night the strong willed and alluring actress, Angelina Brown walks into the bar and sparks fly. She is married but astranged from her husband at the time and passion fills the air. They have a chance at something bigger, but Adam doesn't take it.
He goes back home and sets up housekeeping with Claire and decides he is happy with the life they have created. Until a post on his computer brings him back to an earlier forgotten time. Should Adam live dangerously and explore the option of rekindling this old romance? Is it worth risking the life you have for a chance at the unknown?
This is a novel that pulls the reader in. going along quite innocuously and then building suspense as Adam tries to sort out his life.
Saturday, December 9, 2017
The Purloining of Prince Oleomargarine
What an odd children's story. The Purloining of Prince Oleomargarine. I was so intrigued by the title of this book to check it out of the library, even though I don't have a child to read it to.
The original story is the work of Mark Twain, discovered unfinished and so finished and illustrated by Philip and Erin Stead. It seems a bit dark and violent for young children. It is an allegory that gives the reader an important lesson about the importance of kindness, generosity, and empathy instead of power, intimidation and gold.
Johnny lives with his bully of a grandfather, who sends him off to market with their only skinny chicken. When he comes home with some blue beans given to him by a small old woman, then grandfather yells and throws the beans away. Johnny rescues one last beans and follows the directions from he woman to plant the beans and eat the flower. This leads him on an adventure to rescue a stolen prince and talk with the forest animals. The illustrations are beautiful watercolors, muted and simple.
The original story is the work of Mark Twain, discovered unfinished and so finished and illustrated by Philip and Erin Stead. It seems a bit dark and violent for young children. It is an allegory that gives the reader an important lesson about the importance of kindness, generosity, and empathy instead of power, intimidation and gold.
Johnny lives with his bully of a grandfather, who sends him off to market with their only skinny chicken. When he comes home with some blue beans given to him by a small old woman, then grandfather yells and throws the beans away. Johnny rescues one last beans and follows the directions from he woman to plant the beans and eat the flower. This leads him on an adventure to rescue a stolen prince and talk with the forest animals. The illustrations are beautiful watercolors, muted and simple.
Thursday, December 7, 2017
The Baker's Secret
If you think you have read all the Holocaust stories, there is always another side of the story you have not been told yet. Author, Stephen P. Kiernan has come up with just such a novel. This is the story told through the eyes of a young woman living in the small town of Vergers on the Normandy coast of France.
Emmanuelle, Emma is living in the darkest days of the war in a village that has been invaded by the German army. They have set up a base there and taken over the town. Emma who apprenticed at the side of Ezra Kuchen the baker, now is responsible for baking the daily bread for the invading army.
Her home has been taken to house the Captain of the army. Her father was imprisoned and then killed by the Nazis. The baker has also been taken away by the Nazis. Emma finds her won small way to maintain her dignity and fight back against the oppression, by helping to feed her neighbors.
Under the closely watched eyes of the armed soldiers, Emma builds a clandestine network of neighbors, trading goods with each other to keep people alive, and hopeful until they can be rescued.
This is a story of strength in the face of adversity. The people who have hope and the ones who lose hope. How different people justify their actions to survive. How you can hate a person but in death the hate is gone. Emma looks at the priest who she did not like and thought, "Here was the war's strangest lesson yet. All sorts of people - friends and family, yes, but also adversaries and annoyances - all kinds had died. AS they left behind everything, work, and home and habits and opinions and even hidden chickens, somehow Emma's heart broke for them all, including the ones she couldn't bear. Somehow their dying made them unhateable."
That is such an important lesson in the end and that even at the worst of times people still have the instinct to help others and hope that things will get better. When the Allied Forces arrive on
June 5th, 1944 the people of the town are both awed and ready to help them oust the invading German army.
What a wonderful story this is.
Emmanuelle, Emma is living in the darkest days of the war in a village that has been invaded by the German army. They have set up a base there and taken over the town. Emma who apprenticed at the side of Ezra Kuchen the baker, now is responsible for baking the daily bread for the invading army.
Her home has been taken to house the Captain of the army. Her father was imprisoned and then killed by the Nazis. The baker has also been taken away by the Nazis. Emma finds her won small way to maintain her dignity and fight back against the oppression, by helping to feed her neighbors.
Under the closely watched eyes of the armed soldiers, Emma builds a clandestine network of neighbors, trading goods with each other to keep people alive, and hopeful until they can be rescued.
This is a story of strength in the face of adversity. The people who have hope and the ones who lose hope. How different people justify their actions to survive. How you can hate a person but in death the hate is gone. Emma looks at the priest who she did not like and thought, "Here was the war's strangest lesson yet. All sorts of people - friends and family, yes, but also adversaries and annoyances - all kinds had died. AS they left behind everything, work, and home and habits and opinions and even hidden chickens, somehow Emma's heart broke for them all, including the ones she couldn't bear. Somehow their dying made them unhateable."
That is such an important lesson in the end and that even at the worst of times people still have the instinct to help others and hope that things will get better. When the Allied Forces arrive on
June 5th, 1944 the people of the town are both awed and ready to help them oust the invading German army.
What a wonderful story this is.
Tuesday, December 5, 2017
The Story of Arthur Truluv
Author, Elizabeth Berg writes in her acknowledgements that her editor at Random House said, "I need an Arthur in my life." Berg agreed with her and so do I. As I was reading this fabulous novel there were two thoughts running through my mind; I would love to have an Arthur of my own and I hope that I can be an Arthur to someone else in my life.
The plot of this book is a simple one of love lost and love found. We first meet three characters who are suffering from loneliness and loss in their lives. Each has loved someone who is not apart of their life in the present. It has left them trying to find ways to cope with that loss.
Arthur has recently lost his wife, the love of his life to death. He goes to the cemetary everyday at lunch time and eats his sandwich while talking to Nola's grave. He imagines her there and listening to him. He also seems to have an ability to stand by any gravestone and imagine the person who is buried there and what their life was like before they died.
Next door, lives Lucille, who lives in the home she grew up in. Her high school boyfriend married another woman and she never found another relationship. She has lived alone all these years.
Maddy Harris, is about to graduate from high school. She has had a rough time at school, bullied by the other students. Her escape has been to spend time in the cemetary taking pictures. She does not have a good relationship with her father, who like her is lost after the death of her mother.
As these three characters' lives start to intersect they also find salvation in each other. Slowly their relationships build into friendship and trust. They find in each other what they have not been able to create in any of their other interactions. In the end they find compassion and are able to turn their friendship into the perfect kind of family. Ignoring age differences they all find happiness in their shared experience.
The plot of this book is a simple one of love lost and love found. We first meet three characters who are suffering from loneliness and loss in their lives. Each has loved someone who is not apart of their life in the present. It has left them trying to find ways to cope with that loss.
Arthur has recently lost his wife, the love of his life to death. He goes to the cemetary everyday at lunch time and eats his sandwich while talking to Nola's grave. He imagines her there and listening to him. He also seems to have an ability to stand by any gravestone and imagine the person who is buried there and what their life was like before they died.
Next door, lives Lucille, who lives in the home she grew up in. Her high school boyfriend married another woman and she never found another relationship. She has lived alone all these years.
Maddy Harris, is about to graduate from high school. She has had a rough time at school, bullied by the other students. Her escape has been to spend time in the cemetary taking pictures. She does not have a good relationship with her father, who like her is lost after the death of her mother.
As these three characters' lives start to intersect they also find salvation in each other. Slowly their relationships build into friendship and trust. They find in each other what they have not been able to create in any of their other interactions. In the end they find compassion and are able to turn their friendship into the perfect kind of family. Ignoring age differences they all find happiness in their shared experience.
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