The Dogs of Littlefield by Suzanne Berne

Life in Littlefield, Massachusetts is what you would expect in a small suburban town.  Children play soccer, wives cook dinner, and the community is proud of its various schools, parks and gardens.  When the town decides to create an off-leash dog park on a trial basis, the many dog-lovers of the town are thrilled.  Dogs frolic and people wonder why they hadn’t done this sooner.  Then the signs start popping up on park fences: Pick up after your dog.  Aren’t you ashamed that you don’t? And Leash your beast.  Or else. No one is particularly surprised by this turn of events.  Surely it’s just one of the folks at the nearby community garden, afraid that a dog will trash some freshly planted beds.  Until Feldman, a white bullmastiff, is discovered dead in the dog park by Margaret Downing.

In Berne's The Dogs of Littlefield, sociologist Dr. Clarice Watkins, newly arrived in town to study the elements of a “good life” and its effect on the suburban citizens of Littlefield, takes in the recent rash of dog poisonings.  What author Berne gives us is a funny, honest portrayal of life and the many people in it.  From the ups and downs of marriage, to affairs, dealing with ones children and work, Berne shows us the honest minds of people living their lives.  Lives that are sometimes small, ordinary and filled with minutiae or fear.  What appears on the surface to be a murder mystery involving the dogs of a small town, really becomes a story about people living their ordinary lives.

Some Luck by Jame Smiley

Jane Smiley’s newest novel is the first in The Last Hundred Years trilogy.  The Pulitzer prize winning author intends to cover 100 years in the life of an Iowa farm family and the first novel, Some Luck, covers the years 1920-1953.  Smiley follows the Langdon family of Denby, Iowa through childbirth, death, the Great Depression and World War II in a unique fashion.  Not only does the author write from many of the different characters points of view, but each chapter itself represents one year. 

We begin with Walter, the 25 year-old father and owner of the farm.  His wife Rosanna is about to give birth to their first child, Frank, and he is ruminating on all of the things that farmers think about: which crops to plant this year, how many animals are there to take care of and can I really afford to farm all of this land? As the years move forward, Smiley introduces us to all of the Langdon children: Frank, Joe, Mary Elizabeth, Lillian, Henry and Claire and their unique personalities.  We see Walter struggle with changing technologies (horses vs. tractors) and Rosanna has her own challenges with loss and religion. 

Each of the Langdon children is different than the last, and we hear a lot from the point of view of Frank, the handsomest and, arguably, the most cunning Langdon child.  When the US gets involved in World War II, he joins the army and becomes a sniper while his sensitive younger brother Joe stays home on a II-A deferment and takes care of the family farm.  Lillian falls in love with a handsome stranger and Henry devours books as fast as he can get his hands on them.  The reader is quickly absorbed into the world that Smiley creates and is soon laughing and crying along with the family. 

Some Luck has been shortlisted for the National Book Award and is a profound family saga.

Bark by Lorrie Moore

In one of the eight short stories that make up the collection Bark, a woman comes to realize that, “Living did not mean one joy piled upon another. It was merely the hope for less pain…” Here, in one thought, is the theme of this collection by Lorrie Moore. Middle-aged men and women separate, divorce and try (without much success) to connect with new partners. Career choices and financial decisions have turned out to be mistakes. Children shock and disappoint. Illness looms in the future. Anxiety caused by financial collapse and a distant war hangs over society.  But this book is not as grim as it sounds. The characters in these stories are stoic. And, because Moore is an acclaimed wordsmith with a mischievous sense of humor, they deal with their problems by joking and wisecracking and punning. Moore also creates improbable scenarios that are gently humorous. A woman accidentally cooks a pan of chicken on the CLEAN setting of her oven but takes it to the party anyway. After a motorcycle gang realizes it is terrorizing the wrong outdoor wedding, they apologize and meekly drive away. The stories in Bark are about early 21^st century American life. They are sad, ironic and quirky, just like real life. 

Check out Bark by Lorrie Moore @ the library!

Book of Ages by Jill Lepore

Jane Franklin was the younger sister of Benjamin Franklin. He was the youngest son and she the youngest daughter of a large colonial family in Boston. He was six years older than she and, due to gender, miles ahead of her in opportunity. While he was provided with some education and allowed to leave the family candle-making business for an apprenticeship in printing, she, as was standard for the times, was kept at home with no opportunity for education or choice in employment.  He went on to become one of the wealthiest and most accomplished men of all time: writer, scientist, philosopher, diplomat and Founding Father of our country. She became the wife of a poor man and mother of twelve children, only one of whom survived her. He wrote many books and pamphlets, including his Autobiography and Poor Richard's Almanac which are still read today. Her only book, Book of Ages, was a handmade book for personal use, in which she recorded the births and deaths of her children and husband. But she was a writer, exchanging letters with her brother and other friends throughout her life. Her letters have survived due to her connection to her famous brother.  Now author Jill Lepore has used them to write a life of Jane Franklin.  Few people have ever been as gifted as Benjamin Franklin, but in Book of Ages: The Life and Opinions of Jane Franklin, Lepore paints a picture of a woman whose innate intelligence outshines her lack of education.  Life in the colonies before and during the Revolutionary War required a courage and perseverance hard for modern Americans to comprehend. Jane Franklin’s letters assist historians in their examination of the life of ordinary people in Colonial America. Drudgery, poverty, illness and death were the order of the day for the American colonists, particularly the women. The rights of women lagged behind the Rights of Man and, in fact, were years in coming. But women contributed to the struggle for independence as well as men, as this book shows.

Check out Book of Ages @ the library!

Mommy Dressing: A Love Story, After a Fashion by Lois Gould

Bad mothers are the most interesting mothers, particularly when they are someone else’s.  In this light, Jo Copeland, mother of author Lois Gould, was a particularly interesting mother. She was a perfectionist who could not express any kind of warmth or kindness to her two children. Copeland was a fashion designer for over fifty years, beginning in the 1920’s.  Professionally successful and glamorous, she helped create the American fashion industry (as opposed to the French.) Her designs were worn by such diverse personalities as Gypsy Rose Lee and The Duchess of Windsor. Both Copeland and her husband were shallowly obsessed with appearances and their marriage did not last, leaving Gould and her brother in the care of nannies and housekeepers. They were isolated in their bedrooms, subjected to long periods of enforced silence and strict senseless rules. In general, they were left out of their mother’s life. A father who bragged that he could “handsome up a room” and a mother who would criticize a daughter for perspiring or getting a pimple were not best suited for raising children. However, Mommy Dressing: A Love Story, After a Fashion is not the emotional, self-pitying memoir it could have been. Gould delves into the story of her mother’s own emotionally deprived childhood, a childhood that left her unable to mother her own children. Good writers always have a talent for empathy and sensitivity that helps them explain the incomprehensible behavior of others. Lois Gould’s purpose in writing this book was not revenge but understanding and her success is the reader’s gain.   

Check out Mommy Dressing: A Love Story, After a Fashion @ the library!

American Girl by Mary Cantwell

Born in 1930, Mary Cantwell developed her powers of observation growing up a bit of an outsider in Bristol, Rhode Island, during the Great Depression and War years. Catholic in a mainly Protestant neighborhood and school, she grew up in a close-knit, three-generation family. Her experiences were ordinary for the time and place, but her writing ability makes even mundane aspects of small town life vital and interesting: sharing a bedroom with a sister, having a glamorous aunt, attending school, surviving a polio epidemic, being a Girl Scout, celebrating the Fourth of July, going to the movies, the library, the park, church. Life was slower then and people seemed to do things in a more leisurely way. Today’s shopping experience will stand in stark contrast to a shopping trip with grandma to The Bluebird Shoppe where the ladies of Bristol bought their support garments. Each corset, slip and other unmentionable was removed from its own slender box and tissue paper for examination and fitting and then carefully replaced. With good humor and sincere affection, the author exposes the strengths and weaknesses of small-town homogeneous society, complete with its prejudices, bullying, and sense of safety and generosity of spirit.  American Girl: Scenes from a Small-Town Childhood shows us a world lost to progress. For everything gained, something is lost. 

Check out American Girl @ the library!

Short Nights of the Shadow Catcher: The Epic Life and Immortal Photographs of Edward Curtis

Epic life pretty much sums it up! In the early 1900’s many believed, including Edward Curtis, that the American Indians and their cultures were going to disappear. Curtis photographed American Indians and documented their languages, religions, alphabets, art, etc. as much as humanly possible. He felt that this endeavor was a race against time. This artistic and cultural achievement was also radical for its time, because the majority of this country believed that American Indians had no culture or religion and were barely human. Curtis sacrificed everything for this undertaking, his business, family, money and reputation. This book is recommended for readers that enjoy biographies of larger than life personalities or histories of the United States, photography, the America West, or American Indians.

Check out Short Nights of the Shadow Catcher @ the library!

Bright-Sided by Barbara Ehrenreich

Barbara Ehrenreich uses common sense, critical thinking and a sharp sense of humor to analyze the positive thinking philosophy that influences so much of American society.  Tracing positive thinking back to a nineteenth century backlash against the dourness of Calvin-based religion, she examines the philosophy of Ralph Waldo Emerson’s Transcendentalism and the Christian Science of Mary Baker Eddy.  Moving into the twentieth century, she scrutinizes the self-help books of authors like Norman Vincent Peale and Dale Carnegie, also the belief that attitude can deter the progress of serious disease and the prosperity theology of preachers like Joel Osteen. Finally, she traces our country’s current problems to the wide-spread reliance of politicians, CEOs and managers on feelings and intuition instead of the analysis of hard facts their counterparts used in the past. She concludes that positive thinking is not a benign philosophy which improves our attitude, but rather the purposeful turning of a destructive blind eye to signs of trouble we should be heeding. 

Check out Bright-Sided @ the library!

The Leftovers by Tom Perrotta

What would you do if one day a portion of the population including your friends, family, and neighbors suddenly disappeared?  This is the premise of The Leftovers.  The aftermath of the Sudden Departure is told through the stories of many different characters.  The uncertainty of the event (was it the Rapture or another inexpiable happening?) has changed everyone’s lives.  Some people continue on while others leave the family they have left and join cults such as the Barefoot People and the Guilty Remnant.  In contrast to Tom Perrotta’s other works this book is very subtle and does not have the satire that has become his trademark.  However, it’s a thought provoking book with loose ends that will have the reader drawing their own conclusions.  Checkout The Leftovers @ the library!

I Can't Complain by Elinor Lipman

Author Elinor Lipman indeed seems to have little to complain about. She draws on her life experiences for this collection of essays and has barely a cross word to say about anyone in her personal or professional life. A baby boomer, she was raised in 1950’s Lowell, Massachusetts, by a happy homemaker mother (who lied about her age) and a doting father who was able to make each daughter feel she was his favorite. She grew up in an Irish Catholic neighborhood that fully embraced the only Jewish family on the block. All her friends, relatives, in-laws, in-laws’ friends, friends’ in-laws and co-workers (and their friends, relatives and in-laws) are friendly, successful, interesting and funny. She and her husband and son may have some faults, but those faults are charming and merely add a little spice to their lives. These experiences lead her to some common-sense opinions on how to choose a mate, how to maintain a relationship, how to share cooking chores and a bed and taste in fashion, and how to survive the inevitable death of loved ones. In short, I CAN’T COMPLAIN paints a picture of an American life we’d all like to live.