Xpress Reviews—First Look at New Books

-- Library Journal, 4/22/2008 4:04:00 PM

The week of April 22, 2008

Fiction | Nonfiction | Audio Reviews

Fiction

Hall, Brian. Fall of Frost. Viking. c.342p. ISBN 978-0-670-01866-6. $25.95. F
Verdict: Not a chronological exposition of Robert Frost’s life, this novel effectively dramatizes the main events through short episodes that jump back and forth over a long life. Recommended for all collections, this would be a valuable addition for its fictional, biographical, and critical content.
Background: Hall (The Saskiad) fictionalizes Frost’s life, probing his inner emotions and exploring the germination of his poetry. Born in San Francisco, Frost moved to Massachusetts with his family after his father’s death. He was unable to get anywhere with his writing until he visited pre–World War I England, where he was published and favorably reviewed there. After he returned to the United States, his professional fortunes rose quickly, though his private life was more difficult. He and introverted wife Elinor had five children, most of whom Frost himself survived. Many sections of the novel focus on the poet’s trip to Russia in 1962 during the height of the Cold War, at the age of 88, where he met with Krushchev and tried to persuade the Soviet leader to seek a peaceful solution to the problem of Berlin. Many poems, though evidently only earlier works, are quoted here; throughout, Frost’s poems come across as a force of nature.—Jim Coan, SUNY at Oneonta Lib.

Erdrich, Lise. Night Train. Coffee House, dist. by Consortium. 2008. c.152p. ISBN 978-1-56689-202-5. pap. $14.95. F
Verdict: Erdrich, the author of two delightful children’s picture books, Sacagawea and Bears Make Rock Soup, and other works published in journals and anthologies, proves to be as engaging a writer as her sister, novelist/poet Louise Erdrich. Highly recommended for all libraries.
Background: Erdrich’s first collection of (often quite short) short stories takes place in various rural Native American communities in North Dakota and Minnesota. The stories are sarcastic, caustic, eloquent—some read like prose poems—and are nearly always humorous. "Tribe Unknown (Fleur-de-Lis)" describes the intersections and dispersals of cultures—French, Cree, Ojibway, and Scots—in the several-hundred-year-old history of a woman’s purse, now an artifact in a museum. "Corn Is Number One" retells, in very contemporary pop-psychology slang, the myth of Sky Woman and her daughters Corn, Squash, and Bean. Erdrich also writes of ice cream trucks on the rez, family meals, brawls, recipes—all in the daily life of the collisions of cultures.—Mary Margaret Benson, Linfield Coll. Lib., McMinnville, OR

Nonfiction

Heinkel-Wolfe, Peggy. See Sam Run: A Mother's Story of Autism. Univ. of North Texas. (Mayborn Literary Nonfiction, No. 2). May 2008. c.192p. photogs. ISBN 978-1-57441-244-4. $22.95. PSYCH
Verdict: In this touching and poignant memoir of the roller-coaster emotions of parenting a child with autism, journalist Heinkel-Wolfe writes from the heart as she describes the early years with her son Sam. Recommended for public libraries with parenting and special needs collections.
Background: In chronicling the first four years of Sam's life, Heinkel-Wolfe gives readers an up-close view of the chaos and despair that resulted from knowing that something was not right with her child and yet not being taken seriously. Finally, after receiving a diagnosis of autism for Sam, the family is able to take positive steps toward making sure Sam gets the support he needs at home, at school, and in the community. Sam, now graduating from high school, writes the final chapter, which allows the reader to see from his perspective the path he has traveled. Heinkel-Wolfe’s vivid descriptions of her relationship with her son and her determination to help him show the highs and lows a family experiences when autism is a part of their lives. Resource guides offer general autism information as well as outlets to assist parents in finding help in their area.—Lisa M. Jordan, Johnson Cty. Lib., KS

Manocchia, Pat. Anatomy of Exercise: A Trainer’s Inside Guide to Your Workout. Firefly. May 2008. c.192p. index. ISBN 978-155407-375-7. $35. HEALTH
Verdict: It’s no contest: organized by body area—e.g., core, legs and hips, shoulders, arms—and including warm-up and stretching exercises, an illustrated index, and a glossary of English and Latin terms, this annotated guide outperforms the bulk of other existing books on workout anatomy and instruction. The gymgoing–resistant plastic-laminated hardcover further highly recommends it to the consumer-health collections of all public libraries, for gym rat and serious first-timer alike.
Background: New York City–based fitness expert Manocchia pairs color photos of a male and female model performing a cumulative 50-plus exercises with instructions describing each exercise’s starting position, action, and movement path and advising on what to look for and what to avoid. Lifelike anatomical illustrations on the opposing page then spotlight the active and stabilizing muscles engaged in each movement. The exercises, which call in turns for standard weightlifting equipment, dumbbells, and self-resistance, span all levels of difficulty (e.g., pushups range from standard to "Santana"). The photos of stretching exercises, too, would have benefited from accompanying anatomization, but this book’s immense usefulness in every other respect forgives it that.—Raya Kuzyk, Library Journal

Morrissette, Mikki. Choosing Single Motherhood: The Thinking Woman's Guide. Houghton. May 2008. c.464p. bibliog. ISBN 978-0-618-83332-0. pap. $14.95. PSYCH
Verdict: Morrissette has coined the phrase "Choice Mom" to describe the subject of her book: "someone who proactively seeks to become a nurturing mother on her own." This is an essential purchase for all urban public libraries; recommended to all others.
Background: Morrissette, a single mother of two, estimates that roughly 50,000 partnerless women above the age of 30 give birth every year, and many more consider the option. Here, she initially discusses the concerns that women may have about embarking on parenting—e.g., finances, community acceptance, impact on the child. She presents the results of surveys and other data when it is available but urges each reader to define her own needs. The second section explores the avenues to motherhood—insemination by known or unknown donor and adoption—and describes the legal and emotional pitfalls for all concerned parties (woman, child, and donor). Finally, a section on child rearing will be useful to current as well as prospective Choice Moms; it covers issues such as coping with stress, answering the "daddy questions," and helping teens deal with special identity issues.—Mary Ann Hughes, Neill P.L., Pullman, WA

Mostert, Noel. The Line Upon a Wind: The Great War at Sea, 1793–1815. Norton. Jul. 2008. c.800p. maps. bibliog. index. ISBN 978-0-393-06653-1. $35. HIST
Verdict: Within the Napoleonic Wars—a 22-year conflict that can truly be called the first world war—the war at sea, fought primarily between Great Britain and France and stretching from the New York coast to the Indian Ocean and China, has been the subject of countless books. Journalist Mostert’s is an excellent account that goes beyond the general limits of the literature on the topic. Recommended for all libraries.
Background: Included here are discussions of the evolution of warfare between land and ocean, naval construction, shipboard life, conflict with the Barbary States, and the War of 1812; throughout, the narrative moves smoothly between the main battles and single-ship encounters. Also presented are the revolutionary tactics and new weapons, such as rockets, torpedoes, and submarines, along with the men who made all this happen, from Napoleon and Admiral Nelson to the lowliest able seaman.—David Lee Poremba, Keiser Univ., Orlando, FL

Sautter, Ellen & Diane Crompton. Seven Days to Online Networking: Make Connections To Advance Your Career and Business Quickly. JIST. May 2008. c.192p. index. ISBN 978-1-59357-550-2. pap. $9.95. BUS
Verdict: Online networking is not something every job seeker knows how to handle, so Sautter and Crompton, both with outplacement firm Right Management, attempt to cover social networking, blogs, identity-management sites, web folios, discussion groups, electronic publishing, and online speaking. There are better books for an online networking overview (e.g., Liz Ryan’s Happy About Online Networking) and better books on using LinkedIn (e.g., Steven Tylock’s The LinkedIn Personal Trainer). This book tries to be both and misses twice.
Background: The book is heavily biased toward the networking site LinkedIn. The term LinkedIn appears 40 times in the first chapter, more than four times the combined total of every other site, and is given a 16-page section on getting started, a treatment that is not repeated for any of the other networking tools listed. There are some nuggets of wisdom here, particularly in the sections on developing your "online identity," where the idea of creating an "online elevator speech" comes into play, but the book is badly unbalanced.—Brian Walton, Tampa-Hillsborough P.L.

Audio Reviews

Box, C. J. Blue Heaven. 10 CDs. unabridged. 12 hrs. Sound Library: BBC Audiobooks America. 2008. ISBN 978-0-7927-5229-5. $94.95. F
Verdict: John Bedford Lloyd’s sonorous voice lends a rich texture to the suspense, giving warmth to the good characters and a menacing gravity to the murderous ex-cops. Recommended for those who seek suspenseful tales in which goodness triumphs over evil.
Background: North Idaho—not "Northern Idaho," the locals insist—is the blue heaven where the drama unfolds, and Box makes much of the locale, as in his previous novel, Free Fire. In the woods on a fishing trip, Annie and William Taylor, 12 and ten years old, respectively, witness four men murder a man. Seen by the killers, the two children run away and become hunted. The newly elected sheriff is baffled at their disappearance, and when four retired cops from Los Angeles volunteer to help, he accepts. The main character, Jess Rawlins, is a rancher who harbors, and ultimately saves, the missing children. Box does not hide the obvious from his audience: the four ex-cops are implicated in the robbery and the disappearance of the two children. The strength of the novel derives from the characters and their locale, both finely etched to illustrate that the beauty of the Idaho countryside instills hardy character and good morals, which ultimately destroy the criminal outsiders who have been corrupted by the crime-ridden streets of southern California. [Blue Heaven is also available as downloadable audio from Audible.com; Macmillan Audio also has a version available: 10 CDs. unabridged. 12 hrs. 2008. ISBN 978-1-4272-0268-0. $39.95.—Ed.]—Bernard E. Morris, Modesto, CA

Paretsky, Sara. Bleeding Kansas. 14 CDs. unabridged. 17 hrs. Brilliance Audio. 2008. ISBN 978-1-4233-1982-5. $122.25; 14 cassettes. ISBN 978-1-4233-1980-1. $117.25; 1 MP3 CD. ISBN 978-1-4233-1984-9. $39.25. F
Verdict: Paretsky’s book, featuring an excellent performance by Susan Ericksen, vividly depicts the historic and contemporary dangers of zealotry. For all fiction collections.
Background: Historically, "Bleeding Kansas" described the violent clashes of anti- and proslavery groups over whether Kansas should enter the Union as a free or a slave state. In the 1960s and 1970s, Kansas again played host to deadly ideological disputes—this time over race and the Vietnam War. In this contemporary stand-alone novel set in the Kaw River Valley where New York Times best-selling author Paretsky (Fire Sale) grew up, religion and politics have once again turned neighbor against neighbor. The Schapen and Grellier families have farmed side by side since their ancestors settled the valley as antislavery advocates. While both families are Christian, the Schapens follow an extremely intolerant fundamentalist doctrine, which often places them in direct conflict with their more liberal neighbors. Amateur historian Susan Grellier’s first exposure to local violence is through the diaries of Abigail Grellier from the 1850s and 1860s. When Susan befriends newcomer Gina Haring, a lesbian Wiccan, and together they join an Iraq War protest group, the threat of violence again looms over the valley. When the Schapens lambaste Susan’s "heretical" behavior on their blog, they set into place a series of events with dire consequences for both families.—Beth Farrell, Portage Cty. Dist. Lib., OH