5 Great Books About Dads

In honor of Father’s Day and my wonderful dad, I’ve put together a short list of my favorite books about fathers.

Coop

Memoir of Perry's life raising pigs, chickens, and little girls. Funny, warm, and smart. (The book and the man.)

Hands of My Father

A touching tribute to the author's deaf father.

Cheaper by the Dozen

A funny memoir of Mr. Gilbreth, written by two of his children, and turned into a movie--twice. Very funny. (And I mean snort milk out of your nose funny.)

After Visiting Friends

A nice story of a son looking for answers to his father's death.

A Love that Multiplies

No list would be complete without a nod to the father of 19 children, Jim Bob Duggar. Written with his wife, Michelle.

Here's a great post about dads from Shauna Niequist: Dads Aren't Dumb.

 

Happy Father's Day!

Friday Finds (June 13)

I just ran unto this fabulous feature called Friday Finds at Musings from a Bookmammal. It comes from MizB at Should be Reading. It's simple, you just share the books you've discovered during the week. And what a book week it's been for me! Just when I think the Book Shopping List is getting low and I'll never find another interesting book ever, ever again, it pours down books. Here's what I found this week:

 

Two books by authors I adore. Kathleen Flinn writes fabulous books about cooking and food (check out The Sharper Your Knife, the Less You Cry and The Kitchen Counter Cooking School).

 

Deborah Rodriguez wrote the heartbreaking and beautiful Kabul Beauty School. This picks up where Kabul left off.

 

(Margarita Wednesdays came out this week, but Burnt Toast won't be out until August.)

 

 

I added Killing Kennedy to my Books to Buy list recently. I watch O'Reilly every night, and I love books about presidents, World War II, and American history, but for some reason I never picked up either Killing Lincoln or Killing Kennedy. But Killing Patton really intrigues me for some reason. Think I'll read Killing Kennedy soon. Killing Patton won't be out until September.

 

 

As a Christian Scientist, I tend to stay away from books about medicine/doctors/hospitals, but I recently read a glowing review of God's Hotel, and I'm curious. 

 

I added A Homemade Life because I adored reading Wizenberg's Delancey this week. 

 

Can't remember where I ran onto The Disappearing Spoon this week, but I read an excerpt, and it sounds fascinating--as does his follow-up book, The Violinist's Thumb.

 

I bought a copy of The Smartest Kids in the World for the library last semester, and it intrigued me then. I finally read an excerpt, and I think I might really like it.

 

I ran into Nothing to Envy on Sunlit Pages, and since it's so well-reviewed and since I love to read about other cultures, I added it to my TBR.

 

 

 

Whew. That's quite a list, isn't it? Something from most of my favorite topics: food & cooking, world cultures, history, quirky science.

 

Have you read any of these? Any recommendations for "read alikes"?

 

 

Glitter and Glue, Kelly Corrigan

Glitter and Glue: A Memoir

 

Kelly Corrigan

Category: Nonfiction: Memoir; Parenting & Families

Synopsis: Corrigan recalls the summer she spent as a nanny to a family in Australia where she learned to appreciate her mother.

Date finished: 14 May 2014

Rating: ***

Comments:

I know I read Corrigan’s previous memoir, The Middle Place when it came out, though I don’t remember it at all. And unfortunately, I think this subsequent memoir will follow the same fate. Corrigan is not a bad writer, and she sometimes can be quite insightful, but there just wasn’t enough here to stick with me. It was a nice, quick read, but it’s kind of like eating a Hostess cupcake. Yummy, but you really should have had a turkey sandwich instead.

I can appreciate Corrigan’s fraught relationship with her mother. And it’s a safe topic; everyone has a mother, and most women have difficult moments (or years) with her. But I found the archetypes of the steady, practical mother and the seat-of-her-pants daughter rather boring. I enjoyed the innumerable mom phrases (though the italics got annoying after a while). And I could appreciate the maternal insight Corrigan has now that she couldn’t imagine having while she was a nanny. But, I don’t know, it just didn’t impress me. The whole book felt kind of sad. Corrigan doesn’t seem like a particularly happy person, her mother doesn’t seem like a particularly loving person, and the family Corrigan nannies for are such a fleeting part of her life, there is no conclusion to be reached.

I’ve heard a lot of buzz surrounding this book, and I allowed myself to get caught up in it. I used to read nothing but memoirs, and now that I find myself reading more widely, I miss memoirs. But I’m finding most of them just don’t hold a candle to some of the other great nonfiction on my shelves. Memoirs like this are becoming my equivalent of guilty beach reads.

Would you recommend this to a friend?

Eh. Nah.

 

 

My Passion for Design, Barbra Streisand

My Passion for Design

 

Barbra Streisand

Category: Decorating

Synopsis: Barbra Streisand takes us on a tour of one of her properties, its living spaces and gardens.

Date finished: 28 April 2014

Rating: ***

Comments:

It took me awhile to get through this book as I picked it up and put it down while reading other books. With this stop and start approach, I kind of missed (or forgot) what all of the buildings on this property were used for. I don’t think this collection of dwellings is her main home, but I’m not sure which of the homes she mentioned is. (Being uber-rich has its complications.)

A few thoughts…

1. Streisand loves burgundy. It’s everywhere.

 

2. Streisand loves a monochromatic color scheme, and she’ll often coordinate her outfits to match the room. (Note the cover photo.)

3. Streisand is a Type-A perfectionist with major control issues. And she doesn’t care who knows it. It was kind of fascinating to read just how detail-oriented a person can be and still live a somewhat normal life. (“Fascinating” only because I wasn’t one of the contractors or workman who had to re-do a project several times.) And even if you’re feeling lucky to never have to deal with a person quite like this, you have to respect a woman who knows what she wants and gets it.

4. Many of the photos in the book were taken by Streisand herself. Many of the photos were very, very poor quality. They’d been blown up too far and became grainy and pixelated. I wondered how she could stand for that kind of quality, but then I remembered what she said on page 42: “I don’t watch my movies after I make them. I don’t listen to my records after I record them….The creative process is over for me. It’s done.” She’s likely never looked at the printed book.

So those are my gripes. But it’s not that this book didn’t have a great deal of eye-candy. The rooms were expensive and tasteful. The decorating was thoughtful (and if you read the text, you’ll know just how thoughtful). But most of them didn’t feel lived-in. Only a couple without children and with very well-mannered lapdogs and a staff could maintain them. But then, if you’re Barbra Streisand, you’re likely not sitting around in the living room with an orange soda anyway. You’ve got bigger things on the schedule.

The rooms are a bit too controlled for me. (And I have a high tolerance for controlled designs!) They were too perfect, a little too precious. I just wanted to run from room to room and throw in a pillow with didn’t match or replace a burgundy tassel with an aubergine one (gasp), just to change things up a little. She makes Martha Stewart look easy-going.

I guess you could say I enjoyed the book almost more for the glimpse I got into Streisand’s life than into her home.

I leave you with a quote that gives you a pretty good idea of what the book is like. If it makes you do anything more than snort with derision, this may not be the decorating book for you.

“Everything you see on the grounds was carefully planned to look natural.” (page 69)

Would you recommend this to a friend?

It’s worth looking at—and even reading—but you may want to check it out from the library rather than buy it. (Its list price is $60.)

You might also enjoy:

An Affair with a House

Top Ten Tuesday (top ten of 2014...so far)

 

This week’s topic: Top Ten Books I've Read So Far This Year

I've already read six or seven books this year that I can't imagine not having in my 2014 top ten come December. That means there are only a couple spaces up for grabs. Here's how it stands so far, pretty much in order. Half of the covers are linked to reviews (Blogger unlinked the other half...). So, all reviews but two are available on the Books Read 2014 tab.

  

  

  

  

check out the Best of 2013:

• Top Ten of 2013
• My Book Awards

 

The Signature of All Things, Elizabeth Gilbert

The Signature of All Things: A Novel

 

Elizabeth Gilbert

Category: Fiction

Synopsis: Follows Alma Whittaker’s life throughout the nineteenth century, exploring botany and human passion and belief.

Date finished: 13 May 2014

Rating: *****

Comments:

My goodness. This book is proof that if you go beyond your comfort zone, a whole world of treasures can be found. As you know, I don’t read much fiction. I find I often can’t stomach either the characters or the plot or the writing. Seldom have I found a work of fiction that can satisfy my picky standards for all three, so years ago I just gave up. Leave it to Elizabeth Gilbert to renew my faith in fiction writing.

Now, I know there are two types of readers. There are those who loved Eat, Pray, Love and there are those who hated Eat, Pray, Love. Some people found Gilbert a spoiled narcissist, and swore her off for good. I was in the other camp. I loved everything about Eat, Pray, Love.* I read that book at a time in my life where I was floundering, facing the same ennui Gilbert was. And although I had a stable marriage and no desire to travel the world to shed the feelings that were holding me back, I didn’t begrudge Gilbert her journey.

All that by way of saying, I’m a Gilbert fan. I think she’s one of the best women writers of her generation, and certainly one of my favorites. But when this book came out last year I was bummed. To me it meant it would be another several years before she’d be releasing another memoir (if, indeed, there is another memoir), and I dismissed it. Until, that is, Swapna Krishna reviewed it on her blog a few weeks ago, and I was intrigued enough to read an excerpt.

After two pages, I was sold.

The writing is absolutely stellar. The plot was interesting. The characters were fully-fleshed. The 500-page tome covered eight or nine decades, three countries (America, Tahiti, and Denmark), and topics ranging from botany to mysticism to evolution to abolitionism, and practically read itself. The word “masterful” comes to mind. There’s honestly nothing I would have changed, nothing that seemed too far-fetched (and considering some of the plot threads, that’s quite an assertion).

It’s hard to tell you what this book is about other than a woman’s life, her study of botany and mosses, her relationships, her family, and her growth. It’s a character study, but it is not light on plot. It’s an adventure story, a romance, and a mystery. It’s so many things and like nothing I’ve ever read before.

I know, I know, gushing is unbecoming. I just highly encourage you to give the book a whirl.

Even if you don’t like fiction.

Even if you don’t like Elizabeth Gilbert.

*I also enjoyed Julie and Julia, which puts me in a very small minority.

Would you recommend this to a friend?

Yes. Yes. Yes. And yes.

You might also enjoy:

Eat, Pray, Love

The Boys in the Boat, Daniel James Brown

The Boys in the Boat: Nine Americans and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics

 

Daniel James Brown

Category: Nonfiction: Biography; Sports

Synopsis: A biography of America’s 1936 Olympic-winning rowing team.

Date finished: 4 May 2014

Rating: *****

Comments:

I saved this one for a while, as I do with all books I expect to love. It was worth the wait.

Oddly, I feel like I have very little to say about the book. And what I do want to share seems mostly negative, odd for a book I liked a great deal. The writing is very good. It’s serviceable, straightforward, not affected in anyway, and definitely not boring. Rowing isn’t exactly an easy sport to describe, but Brown did so in a way that I got a pretty good idea of what’s involved (i.e., every muscle group and a whole lot of mental fortitude) and of the endurance and determination required to race crew. I’m not a sports enthusiast, but I can appreciate a sport like rowing that requires skill, physical stamina, and mental acuity.

But there is a niggling dissatisfaction about this book that stays with me. Maybe this is due to my own expectations. I had expected, after all of Brown’s discussion of the vital importance of teamwork in a sport like rowing, not to mention that they were an Olympic team, that the team would be the focus of the book. I was 200 pages in before it dawned on me that I’d only met one rower, and only a couple of the other teammates in passing. The book focuses almost exclusively on one rower, Joe Rantz, his difficult family life, and the importance of rowing to his getting a Depression-era education. This was disappointing.

Since I didn’t feel like I knew the team, I didn’t feel nearly as invested in the Olympic race as I could have been. I think this was a glaring missed opportunity on Brown’s part.

I also think the first half of the book dragged a bit. It was interesting, but I think it could have been edited down to make space for the rest of the crew.

But the book had heart. And the book taught me about a sport I knew nothing about, had never even seen performed. I also learned about the shell (boat) itself, and how it was made. That was fascinating. Also, the writing of the race scenes was impressive. The pacing was breathless, and you really felt like you were in the boat. Brown also did an exceptional job setting this crew against the background of the time period, especially the Depression and Hitler’s rise to power.

So, in all, I was satisfied enough with the book, but I still nurse a bit of disappointment over what could have been. Then again, this read came just a couple months after Laura Hillenbrand’s masterful Seabiscuit, who, although a racehorse, had a surprising amount in common with these boys of the same era. It sounds like an odd comparison, but my mind made it nonetheless.

Would you recommend this to a friend?

Definitely.

You might also enjoy:

Seabiscuit
Unbroken