My book club just finished Exit West by Mohsin Hamid. I liked it. I don't know that I would have chosen it on my own, but it was something different. There was a little bit of "magical realism", but it was mostly pretty realistic. It takes place in a dystopian, not-too-distant future. The two protagonists, Nadia and Saeed, live in an unnamed middle eastern city in which things are going from bad to worse. In fact there is not a location in the whole story which is not going from bad to worse. Nadia and Saeed are in love, and decide that they have to flee their city. Which is where the bit of magical realism comes in. The "doors" are an open secret. They are like worm-holes, which lead to somewhere else. Hopefully where life is easier and less dangerous. But that is a gamble, sometimes you win, and sometimes you lose. My favorite part was the last chapter, which is more or less an epilogue, and takes place 50 years later than the rest of the story. It leaves a bit of hope; bad times don't last forever.
The next selection for the book club is This Blessed Earth: A Year in the Life of an American Family Farm by Ted Genoways. I am interested to see how the subject is treated; hopefully neither a nostalgic elegy nor an overly pessimistic view of the future of farming. According to the reviews on Amazon some environmental concerns are addressed, particularly the shrinking of the Ogallala Aquifer. As we were discussing on a previous thread, water shortages are likely to fuel some of the conflicts of the future.
Another book in my reading queue is The Tenth Island: Finding Joy, Beauty, and Unexpected Love in the Azores. This one isn't a book club selection; it showed up as a Facebook ad, and looked interesting. Turned out it is available in the Amazon Prime lending library to read free. So I bit; figured I didn't have anything to lose. Looks to be in the tradition of Under the Tuscan Sun, or Eat, Pray, Love.
The thing all of these books had going for them is that they aren't about dysfunctional politics or church sex-abuse scandal train wrecks.
Exit West was one of the books featured in PBS awhile back. Sounds interesting.
ReplyDeleteI just finished Roth's The Human Stain, which seems full of outrage and pessimism. I found it worthwhile and thought-provoking, and it for with my old-school literature theme.
I read Exit West a few months ago. I liked it, didn't love it but did like it. Thought the magic was a bit extraneous, would love to hear folks' points of view as to whether it was necessary.
ReplyDeleteI'm reading "The Idiot" by Elif Batuman. It's the second novel with that title I've read recently; I read Dostoevsky's novel by that name early last year. No connection between the two that I've been able to discern so far. Batuman's is about a Turkish-American suburban girl who goes to Harvard in the late 1990s. Amusing and interesting, if you're amused and interested by the trials and travails of the elites. I'm about halfway through it so far.
For my diaconal reading I'm working my way through "Divine Renovation: Bringing Your Parish from Maintenance to Mission" by Fr. James Mallon. It's sort of an archdiocesan reading assignment: our parish staff, and theoretically other parishes' staffs, are reading it as part of the archdiocese's Renew My Church program. Very good book so far. Same genre as the Rebuilt series, but less (so far) of a how-to manual, and more rooted in the church's teaching tradition. I'm only a few chapters in, so presumably we'll get to the how-to sooner or later. Renew My Church is the archdiocese's strategic plan for combining/twinning/closing parishes and schools - actually it's much more than that, but those are the aspects that will roil the waters.
Jim, I actually don't think the "doors" in Exit West were necessary. But they were a metaphor for planes, trains, and automobiles, among other things. And we didn't have to read endless accounts of how they got from point A to points B,C, and D. Since that really wasn't what the story was about, the doors were convenient.
DeleteGood luck with "Divine Renovation". I think everybody is dealing with having to do some reshuffling, and unfortunately some twinnings and closings. Our archdiocese will do okay. But Grand Island is hurting pretty badly. It goes along with rural depopulation across the board. They can't close or twin any more parishes without making people drive 60 miles for Mass. Lincoln is always bragging about all their vocations, seems like they could share a few priests across the river.
I'm reading "America: the Farewell Tour" by journalist Chris Hedges. Basically, a collection of his polemical columns describing and decrying the collapse of an empire, our own. In it, he covers the downward slide of Scranton, pornography in America, ruination of Atlantic City, drug addiction, deindustrialization. Being a pessimist myself, I guess you could consider this catering to my confirmation bias. Right now, our empire's star seems to be setting and the Chinese rising. But I believe all empires will be brought to heel or worse by climate change and ecological collapse. I used to think guys like Hedges and Chomsky were fringe loony tunes. I have come to think their views are correct.
ReplyDeleteRaber just ordered another Chris Hedges book from the liberry. I expect to be hearing soon how I just do not understand how awful everything.
DeleteThe difference between Raber and me is that I never expected everything to be less than awful. Life is suffering. People with some level of optimism are the ones who get so incensed. They feel ripped off.
I keep telling him I was a believer a long time ago, and he would be better off writing screeds to his elected reps instead of giving me lectures.
Sounds like Raber and I would make one heck of an echo chamber.
DeleteFor spiritual reading I am reading "Introduction to the Devout Life" by St. Francis de Sales. I started it once before but got sidetracked by stuff going on in my life. Doing better this time. Francis de Sales comes across as a sweet and gentle person.
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