I A-door You: Book Review of The Ten Thousand Doors of January

 

The Ten Thousand Doors of January by Alix E. Harrow

Gratitude

The Ten Thousand Doors of January by Alix E. Harrow was a book club pick. I can’t remember if I voted for this title, but I am glad it was chosen, as it has been my favorite thus far.

Description

The Ten Thousand Doors of January is about January, a girl who has been raised by her father’s wealthy employer, while her father finds travels the world tracking down artifacts for the employer. Mr. Locke, her guardian, seems to be grooming her in order to present her to society once she comes of age. What January doesn’t know is anything of her heritage, either about her mother or father’s sides, or what her guardian expects of her once he deems her ready for society. 

January is a creative and imaginative girl, and Mr. Locke seeks to reign her in and make her demure and obedient. As a child of color in the hands of a wealthy White man, she is not just a pawn but also an experiment in the possibility of including a person of color. Not at their level, of course, but below them and under their control, as well as at their mercy.

But with everything that January does not know about her past or her own capabilities, they might not be able to keep her at their mercy forever.

Luckily, January is not alone on her journey–she has Jane, her ally in Locke’s home; Samuel, her one childhood friend; and Bad, the best dog.

The Ten Thousand Doors of January ignited my imagination in a way few books have. Like Kelly Link and Aimee Bender, Harrow takes a world that is mostly ours and gives it a twist. As a young girl, January remembers writing in a diary and a door opening on an abandoned property. January was severely punished for making up such a story by Mr. Locke. Here began her wrestling with the imagination—as clearly a good girl was to stay grounded, to build a life of logic, not one of words or the life of the mind.

Would I Teach This Book?

Would I teach The Ten Thousand Doors of January? That is an excellent question–I thoroughly enjoyed Harrow’s The Ten Thousand Doors of January and appreciated the socioeconomic discussion in the book as well as the commentary on colonialism. The book would fit into a Multicultural Literature class I taught and would pair well with the short story “This is Not a Wardrobe Door” by Merc Fenn Wolfmoor. Both use the portal trope and have more diverse casts. I can see including the book in a variety of different literature courses, including one on diversity in fantasy books.

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The Coal Miner's Daughter Is Blue: Book Review of The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek

 

The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek by Kim Michele Richardson

Description

In The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek by Kim Michele Richardson, Cussy is a proud book woman–a packhorse librarian employed by the federal government during the Great Depression to deliver reading materials to people who would not usually have access to books due to their remote locations. She travels her route through rural Kentucky on her trusty mule and brings books, pamphlets, and scrapbooks she makes filled with interesting articles, cleaning tips, and local knowledge, such as how to divine a well or crochet patterns. While her patrons live in poverty and many are starving, Cussy believes that the service brings them comfort and fulfills a different kind of hunger.

Before her position as a packhorse librarian, Cussy found it even more difficult to fit in—she has blue skin, a real condition that a Kentucky family lived with. Many people treat Cussy as though she is repulsive and making a match has proven quite difficult. It has also encouraged creepers to hunt and threaten her. But on her librarian route, most are grateful, even elated, to see her.

Two main themes of The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek are prejudice and poverty. Cussy suffers at the hand of both. Her father is a coal miner, which is difficult and dangerous work as well as paying below subsistence living.

Would I Teach This Book?

Would I teach The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek? This book gives an interesting snapshot of rural America during the Great Depression. It is fascinating to learn about the packhorse librarian program begun by the WPA. The genetic condition of the people whose skin appears blue added another level to the story. Ultimately, though, the book seems to rely more on historical aspects than creating a character with significant depth. Cussy is lovable—and, as a reader, it is easy to cheer her on—but she is far from being one of the great characters of literature.

It is unlikely that I would teach The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek, though I do think there is plenty for a book club to discuss.

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A Real Gem: Book Review of The Last Legacy

 

The Last Legacy by Adrienne Young

Gratitude

Thank you to St. Martin’s press and GoodReads Giveaways for the review copy of The Last Legacy by Adrienne Young.

Description

When I received three books from Goodreads for the same drawing, Fable, Namesake, and The Last Legacy, I assumed they were all from the same series. However, once I started The Last Legacy I quickly realized that Bryn Roth was the star of the show, and she has very little in common with Fable, the main character of the first two books. The Last Legacy is set in the same world as Fable’s stories, and the Roth family plays a role in Namesake, including Bryn’s love interest, Ezra. Bryn’s background is extremely different from Fable’s. Fable was raised on a ship while Bryn was raised by her great aunt to be a debutante. Fable becomes a crew member on a boat while Bryn is forced to join the ruthless Roths in their homestead in the city.

The Roths, lead by Henrik Roth, will do whatever it takes to get ahead. And now that Henrik has his sights set on a merchant’s ring, he will require his family to go to any lengths to get there--and for Bryn, that includes marriage. Bryn realizes that if she wants to avoid the possibility of being given away in a trade deal, she will have to make herself indispensable in other ways.

Meanwhile, she finds herself sparking against Ezra, who apprenticed with the Roths and now is just as much a part of the family as any other member. He is also talented, and his skills will play a big role in the Roths' bid for a merchant’s ring.

I find Bryn’s crush on Ezra troubling, as he has learned to show no emotion as a result of Henrik’s strict rule. He seems to be guarded at all times and follows the instructions of Henrik without question. Indeed, he gives Bryn barely any encouragement. And yet, Bryn pines for him. Even when it is against his own best interests, she makes moves--even when he asks her to stop and tells her it is a bad idea. I am all for a lady making the moves and getting what she wants--but Ezra is a bad idea. He cannot talk to her, even if he wanted to, because Henrik's strict control, so all that Bryn really knows is that Henrik won Ezra as his apprentice in a game of dice. The Last Legacy would have been a better book without the romance. Or, at least with enough to go on to make Bryn's pursuing Ezra simply rash and not utterly dangerous. For all we or Bryn knows, he is actually a brute and a womanizer. 

Would I Teach This Book?

Would I teach The Last Legacy? The Last Legacy was an interesting read. Bryn is a strong character who is determined to find her own path. She refuses to crumble under the harsh will of her uncle or to give up hope that she will have some independence. Henrik is a good villain--impossibly controlling and seems impossible to beat. Plenty of page turning in the plot. Bryn, though, while I did root for her, is not as loveable as Fable. It is unlikely that I would teach The Last Legacy, because although I did enjoy the story, as both the world and character building were not as strong as in Fable and Namesake, which would be better choices to teach.


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Celebrity Memoir Bonanza: I'm Glad My Mom Died and The Woman in Me Reviews

 

I’m Glad My Mom Died by Jennette McCurdy

Gratitude

Thank you to Montgomery County Public Libraries for making The Woman in Me by Britney Spears ready available to the public at no charge and thank you to my book club for having me and for choosing I'm Glad My Mom Died as our March read.

Description

Jennette McCurdy’s I’m Glad My Mom Died tells the story of McCurdy’s childhood in performing and her rise to fame, all under the tight wing of her mother’s control. Her mother was a master manipulator, using bullying, guilt trips, and sweet talk (but only when necessary) to get those around her to do as she wanted.

Being a cancer survivor was more fodder for her machinations, and every week, her mother sat her family down to watch a video featuring her cancer. McCurdy opens the book with the memory of using her birthday wish to ask for her mother’s continued survival.
The first part of the book is very much about living in her mother’s dream for her and working hard to earn her mother’s approval. The second part is McCurdy struggling to find her way after her mother died.

There are lots of shocking and terrible things McCurdy’s mother did to her, including encouraging her to be anorexic, as well as details of McCurdy’s relationships and addiction. She writes about her traumas as though they are fresh and the truth of their deep pain has only recently been discovered, which may well be true.

The Woman in Me by Britney Spears

At the same time I was reading I’m Glad My Mother Died I was also reading Britney Spears' The Woman in Me. Spears’ childhood also featured some questionable moments, such as her mother taking her out for drinks when she was a teen and being kept awake at night by her mother screaming at Spears' drunken father. However, it was more Spears’ adulthood than her childhood that was traumatic.

As an adult with two small children, Spears was put under a conservatorship controlled by her father—for over a decade. Her children were taken away as well as her right to make any major decision for herself—dating, eating, and even her setlist was carefully controlled by her father.

Meanwhile, her father squandered her money and her ex-husband was free to party and do as he pleased with their kids. The injustice and utter insanity of the situation seems unbelievable–how could this happen to one of the richest and most powerful women in the music industry? And yet, it did.

Celebrity and the Media 

I watched some iCarly episodes when they were on Nickelodeon, but was not as familiar with McCurdy’s story as Spears. I remember Spears' being stalked by the media and the seemingly endless photos of her young adulthood in the celebrity gossip magazines. As she describes in The Woman in Me, her every move was publicly examined, questioned, and judged. She was, in that moment, one of the most famous and beloved people in the world and at the same time derided for being sexy and depicted as being dumb. Even as her music and music videos were nearly omnipresent, the discussion was seldom about the music and almost always about Spears.

From reading these two memoirs, I learned a lot about Spears and McCurdy but also a considerable amount about myself. Both women describe how as performers, the public acts as if they are public property and the paparazzi act as if there are no boundaries to their accessibility. TBH, there are many times when I have discussed celebrity lives, including Spears’, as though they were figures who belonged to the collective and not actual people.

I remember inspecting beach pics of Spears and discussing whether or not she was pregnant. The fact that she was clearly unaware of the camera and therefore had not given consent to be photographed was not something that crossed my mind. I remember thinking and speaking of her as a silly, no-talent, dumb girl. She was by this point a multimillionaire who was writing and recording music, performing for enormous audiences, and having a hand in every detail of her performances, including choreography. She was also clearly an adult woman, and no longer a little girl. I went to a concert of hers and unfortunately don’t remember it so well—I was more focused on having fun with my friends. 

When Spears’ writes of the constant scrutiny, it reminds me of how I have previously dismissed such complaints from celebrities–I thought that it simply came with the territory of being a celebrity, along with the money and influence. I did not think of them as the same as the rest of us—I discussed them as though I knew what was going on with their lives and what was going through their heads—more like their lives were real-life soap operas to watch and enjoy. Reading McCurdy’s and especially Spears’ memoirs, it made their humanity clear, as well as the harm that my behavior, following the collective, has caused.

As individuals and a group, we choose what to consume from the media, and just as with food, we can make healthy and unhealthy choices. Going along with media that shines an unhealthy and gendered light on women only encourages this behavior, and while it is more visible on the celebrity level, it certainly trickles down to the average human, as well. If the focus is more on what female celebrities wear than the actual work they do, so will the focus be skewed for the rest of is.

Would I Teach These Books?

Would I teach The Woman in Me or I'm Glad My Mom Died? That is an interesting question. While I am waiting to see how the discussion of I’m Glad My Mother Died goes with my book club, the online buddy read of The Woman in Me (unfortunately, I was not able to participate during the actual discussions), was a lot about connecting with the book and reminiscing of those times, as well as some big fan moments.

I am not a big reader of celebrity memoirs, though I have read a few. As memoirs go, McCurdy’s is written better than Spears', though I would not say that either is particularly well-written or poorly-written. Their story is more important than the writing itself. For that reason, I would probably not choose either for a creative writing class. However, I would consider The Woman in Me for a gender studies course. Spears offers a snapshot of what it was like to be a young woman performer in the late nineties and early 2000s. She shows how she was depicted as a performer, woman, and mother. There is a lot to discuss and a lot to think about.

For McCurdy, I would consider it a good book club pick but would probably not teach it.

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Do You Smell What's Cooking?: Book Review of The Scent Keeper

 

The Scent Keeper by Erica Bauermeister

Description

In The Scent Keeper, Erica Bauermeister's Reese's Book Club pick, Emmeline has an enchanted childhood—she grows up on a remote island with only her father, the machine he uses to capture scents, and eventually she gets a pet goat. She has never been anywhere but the island--the get most of their food from scavenging and from boxes of staples, which her father tells her are dropped off by mermaids.

One day Emmeline must leave their island and join the outside world, where everything is foreign to her and she has no idea how to manage the senses she’d heightened on the island, which are now overwhelmed by the stimulus of a life with others.

The Scent Keeper is, in part, a discussion of socialization and the ways in which children are taught explicitly and implicitly to ignore their instincts for the sake of fitting in and the approval of others. Emmeline finds herself overwhelmed by all the odors that congregate around humans and the social rules no one explains to her. Her one friend is another misfit who can’t quite fit in, but they fit with each other. 

Would I Teach This Book?

Would I teach The Scent Keeper? The Scent Keeper is told in first person, from Emmeline’s naive point of view. There is so much she does not understand about other people and the desires that they have. Her innocence is, at times, as cloying as the scents she describes. In terms of this narration and this outsider perspective, the book is interesting, and invites the reader to question the ways we are socialized, such as at school, where strangeness is often punished. Emmeline’s ability to recognize and eventually pair smells is one that can be used for great gain. Like so many abilities, it can be monetized, and another result of our socialization is how we view and eventually use our talents.

The Scent Keeper has a charm and a wonder that is linked to the story telling, and can certainly offer a rousing conversation. The story telling, however is not remarkable, and moments of the plot seem too farfetched. While it lent to a good discussion in book club, I would most likely not teach The Scent Keeper.

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Mind Over Matter: Book Review of The Institute

 

The Institute by Stephen King

Gratitude 

Thank you to the Montgomery County Libraries for providing Stephen King’s The Institute free for public use.

Description

Stephen King’s The Institute features Luke, a twelve year old kid who is also a genius. He’s about to begin attending two universities at the same time and is excited to begin this next portion of his life. Then everything is upended—Luke wakes up in his bedroom that is not his bedroom, but a re-creation at the Institute. At the Institute, Luke discovers that all the children have ESP or telekinetic powers. None of them know exactly why they’re at the institute. They also don’t know what happens when they leave the intake part of the Institute, but Luke knows it’s nothing good. And while he also knows that there’s no way to escape the Institute, Luke knows he must find a way out.

There are many parallels between The Institute and Firestarter—both feature exceptional children who are kidnapped and tested on. In both, children are separated from their parents. And in both, the children must find a way to escape their captors.

Would I Teach This Book?

Would I teach The Institute? The Institute, published in 2019, is classic Stephen King, and written in much cleaner and more sophisticated prose than Firestarter, which was published in 1980. The books are similar enough that in my fantasy course on Stephen King, I would probably not teach both. One represents King’s early work, when he was first establishing his presence as a best selling author and the other represents his more skilled work, decades into his career. In considering teaching a class that represents an author’s work, it makes sense to represent different moments in their career.

While The Institute is arguably better written than Firestarter, Firestarter is, again, the classic, and lives in the American psyche in a way that The Institute does not. A book like Fairy Tale might better represent the breadth of King’s work than The Institute. While it is better than many of King’s books, The Institute would not be a good fit for the course I long to one day teach.

I did enjoy reading The Institute--it is a solid Stephen King book.

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Strangers as Friends Not Yet Met: Book Review of Iona Iverson's Rules for Commuting

 

Iona Iverson's Rules for Commuting by Clare Pooley

Description

In Iona Iverson’s Rules for Commuting by Claire Pooley, Iona has sat in the same spot, riding on the train for many years to her job as an Agony Aunt, as the British call it, or, in the American vernacular, a magazine advice columnist. Every day she sees the same people on the train but never talks to them—until an emergency forces her to speak up. From there, there’s no stopping Iona.

While the chapters of the book are told from alternating points of view, Iona is the star. She is an absolutely fabulous character to get to know—she is dramatic, self-assured, and not ready to be stuffed in the closet with the outdated merch. Although Iona is no longer young, she is quite far from old.

Her backstory is incredible—an it-girl of the 80s and 90s, invited to all of the best parties, and paid to write about her adventures. Also a civil rights activist and performer, Iona is something special. It is difficult not to love her.

The book's ensemble cast is rounded out with Emmie, a young woman in advertising, Sanjay, a nurse, Piers, in finance, and Martha, a high school student. Written in third person, each characters story is mixed and blended with the others.

Much of the book is about Iona fighting ageism and the ways that women are made to feel irrelevant as they grow older. Iona is in an industry in which appearance and being with the zeitgeist is important, and, like other women, she gets squeezed from her place of power by a combination of changing and reducing responsibilities and bullying. As much of culture is shaped around youth, Iona's experience will resonate with many.

Would I Teach This Book?

Would I teach Iona Iverson's Rules for Commuting? I read Iona Iverson’s Rules for Commuting as part of my book club and we had a lively discussion around it. I would have been unlikely to come to it on my own. However, I am glad that I read it. Though there are serious topics discussed, the book does not feel heavy—the ensemble cast and premise give it a light-hearted feel.

Iona Iverson’s Rules of Commuting would fit in a contemporary literature course, perhaps contemporary British literature. I would be less likely to teach it in a creative writing course because the books I generally choose are more literary and daring and don’t follow prescribed plots or characters.


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