Lovers of Asian Sagas, Rejoice

The Throne of the Five Winds by S.C. Emmett

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


I have a love/hate relationship with this book, and it would have gotten 5 stars from me if not for a couple of peculiar choices the author or editing team has made. It was unputdownable if not for those. Number 1 mistake: footnotes instead of glossary for terms the author tells me there are no English words for. Really? A colorful bird that fans its tail and has a horrific voice? And you need to tell me that "sleepflower" makes a potion that makes people sleep? (And an overdose can kill.) Really? That needs a footnote of explanation? Those are the most egregious examples, but most of these terms are understandable enough to glean from context, and footnotes throw me out of the story, breaking a rhythm of reading I'd rather not break. Glossary, front or back, would let people make their own choice to look up the fake words or not.
Number 2 mistake: the foreword where you tell me these terms need to be explained. Lots of folks do these seemingly historical footnote projects, but usually they are done in books that have an obviously alien setting and context, whereas this book is obviously a mashup of the stories of Genghis Kahn and Tamerlane with an authentic historical flavor, and in the afterword, the author thanks authors and actors she has read and watched for research (without naming any of them).
Anyone with any experience watching or reading Chinese sagas will recognize this time period. It isn't a flaw, except for the attempt to disguise it by the aforementioned intro and footnotes.
The storytelling is great, the characters believable, would be 5 stars if not for stupid choices.



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Thanks to the Women

The Giver of Stars by Jojo Moyes
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I’m always fascinated by books about books and libraries; this Reese Witherspoon Bookclub pick focuses more on the librarians and the freedom literacy can bring.
It’s the distressing 1930s, in between the wars, and listless socialite Alice is excited to marry handsome Bennett Van Cleve, who’s in England on a ministry trip with his coalmine-owning father. She’s going to live in America!
What she finds when she arrives is that she’s not going to live in a vibrant city, but a small town in rural Kentucky, which feels more like prison to her than the life she was escaping.
Alice is surrounded by strangers and by poverty, both material and emotional, that she’s never experienced and never before seen. But Alice isn’t shallow from her life of privilege—just ignorant—and this is her coming of age story.
The Federal Works Project Administration has funded the Pack Horse Library Project and in defiance of her father-in-law, she’s joined the project as a librarian along with four other women, pledging to deliver books throughout the hills and hollers of Appalachia.
Alice’s father-in-law believes women have no place outside the home, and no rights within it. He believes that might and money make right. Miners all over the country are trying to unionize out of their terribly unsafe working conditions, and literate hillbillies don’t sign papers that allow themselves to be evicted off their own land. Van Cleve is threatened by the change happening all around him and will hire anything done to stop it; he fixates on Margery, the local free spirit that’s heading the charge for change. This creates most of the tension in the book, for despite Alice being the main character, it’s actually Margery’s story that matches the Amy Lowell poem that gives the book its title. She’s one of those larger than life characters that do exist in the real world who inspire us to do better and dream bigger.

It’s always good to wander through the woods of Appalachia and Moyes brings the scenery to life as well as the people; all in all, a good read.


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A Source of Hope

Reconnecting to the Source: The New Science of Spiritual Experience, How It Can Change You, and How It Can Transform the World by Ervin Laszlo
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I was grateful to win a Goodreads Giveaway for an advance copy of this book, on sale in March 2020 (it still needs quite a bit of proofing, btw.).
I initially had trouble with the choppy structure of the book, but eventually I realized this is an attempt to make the ideas more digestible: short bites. The early chapter on scientific theory, while dense, is short. Mainly it supplies the support to the theory of a holotropic universe: everything trends toward wholeness.

Positives: overview of current theory connecting spiritual experience and quantum physics; great stories from famous people about their spiritual experiences; excellent guidance on practices; beautiful explanations of how Buddhist and Taoist wisdom reflects quantum thought.

This would be good for those just beginning to explore these ideas; those who have limited experience in the creative arts; and those who have or want no overtly religious framework to their exploration of the intersection between physical and spiritual realities. It's also inspirational for those of us who may have read and practiced more widely in this area; I’ve read Dean Radin’s story before, for example, but I was pleasurably surprised by quite a few of the others.

There's no input from indigenous or Jewish or Christian mysticism except as implied in the personal essays however, so it’s not comprehensive in that sense. Nor is it heavy on the science outside that early chapter, though there are good references scattered throughout the text. (For those who are interested in the science of how quantum physics and neuroscience intersect, I recommend How Emotions Are Made, by Lisa Feldman Barrett.)

All in all, one to recommend to the curious, and a worthy addition to any spiritual library.




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Questions Are The Best Teachers

The Lesson by Cadwell Turnbull

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Thought-provoking, which I believe is the point. There are actually a lot of lessons learned, even if the lesson being taught remains in question. It's actually a pretty amazing thing to pull off, a book that keeps talking once the covers are closed, a book that lives inside a person. The themes go much deeper than colonialism if you want them to: a book itself is an invasion by an alien consciousness, no matter that we invite them in. The characters live. This is definitely one of those crossover books like The Sparrow. I thought I was going to end up being depressed, but instead I'm left with the comfort of the ocean. I don't know that I'd want to read a sequel, but I'd definitely like to read more from this author.



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Intentional Change, Authentic Coaching

Helping People Change: Coaching with Compassion for Lifelong Learning and Growth by Richard Boyatzis
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

If you want to be a more inspiring person or a better leader, if you want to attract—and keep—the millennial generation in your workplace, this science-backed book is the replacement for the ultimately ineffective One Minute Manager of the last century. But organizations, therapists, coaches, pastors, and helpers who counsel others will also find a valuable resource in these 200 pages. It also works as a self help book. In fact the authors point out that in order to help someone else to enable lasting change, you need to do the same self care and homework that you encourage your clients, family, or staff to do.
The research (including functional MRI brain scans) shows that in order to make behavioral change lasting, you have to accentuate the positive over the negative; people shut down when they feel blame and judgement from the rational mind, and it’s the emotions that rule behavior. Instead of triggering the stress hormones that come from the rational mind and the sympathetic nervous system, you need to engage the parasympathetic nervous system—the creative mind—and engage the hormones of creativity more often. It's not a balance of equals: the carrots must outnumber the sticks, the praise must come more often than the threats, or change won't last.
It’s still a version of threats and rewards, fear and love, carrots and sticks, but now we know they work better if they’re inner driven, not imposed. You can’t motivate from the top down, or force people to change from the outside in, as sages have been saying for millennia—and now there’s research to prove it.
For a university press book, there’s surprisingly little jargon, though the aforementioned carrots and sticks are called Positive Emotional Attractors and Negative Emotional Attractors. (Obligatory acronyms of PEA and NEA.) There are helpful sidebars and anecdotal stories, with plenty of science cites in the notes. Anyone willing to do the work of reading and inner investigation will come away knowing how to engage with people on a core level in order to truly help—though you’ll have to do the action steps in order to be effective. Highly recommended.


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Huck Finn Updated

During the Great Depression of the 1930s, four orphans, ages 16 downwards, create their own family and escape the abusive Lincoln School for Indians in Minnesota, heading to St.Louis in a canoe. Murder, mayhem, and magic ensue. Nurturing hope, pursued by evil throughout their entire journey, they are helped and harmed in turn by the other people they encounter. On the rivers and in the towns they meet gamblers and thieves, whores and liars, faith healers and phantoms—both good and bad among them, the flotsam and jetsam of humans caught up in a time of huge upheaval.

This novel is a fantastic story of the real America, still on hand, with its hustlers and innocents trampled. Krueger also highlights the spiritual life of youth in this coming of age story: their sense of justice and mercy, their judgements of self and others, their seemingly clear vision of the hypocrisy of adults, their sense of wonder and gratitude.

This Tender Land is an adventurous and tender book. Though his villains have progressed to a place beyond redemption in this life, hurting children for their own ends, Krueger still leaves us with compassion for those who make bad choices in life and hope for those in horrific circumstances.

As I read, the adventures of Huckleberry Finn immediately came to mind, and indeed in the afterward the author pays homage to Twain. The rascal Huck was always more adult than Tom Sawyer—he had to be—and the technique of telling the story from the perspective of a main character recalling (and probably embellishing) the past works really well here. William Kent Krueger is a great writer, but like his narrator, he’s a wonderful storyteller, moving things along while making us care—and that’s harder.

There’s something for everyone in this book: drama, humor, and heart—with a touch of magic and mystery as well. It would make a fantastic read-aloud to share, an engaging book club book. It really is one for the ages, I hope to become a classic—one of the best books of the year. (Thanks to Atria and Netgalley for the digital review copy.)

Things You Save in a Fire by Katherine Center
My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Cassie isn't quite sure how she ended up trading her job as a firefighter in her Austin hometown to move to Massachusetts for a year to help out her mom—the woman who abandoned her husband and Cassie on the disastrous night of Cassie's sixteenth birthday a decade ago. But her dad thinks she should, so she says goodbye to everyone who cares about her to move clear across the country. She knows it won't be easy: Austin's firefighters are integrated and funded, with respect for women coworkers and budgets that supply the latest technologies. Small town Massachusetts is sexist and underfunded. Actually, Cassie kind of needed to get out of town: she was getting a plaque for bravery as a firefighter, but the substitute bigwig presenter was a big shock: the boy who ruined her birthday and solidified her distrust of romance. He patted her butt. On stage. Firefighter reflex, she punched him on contact. On stage. That's enough reason to get out of town while the smoke blows over, even if it does mean dealing with her mom, who she hasn't seen since the morning of that fateful sixteenth birthday. Cassie has done a good job of protecting her heart up until now, but the stress of proving herself on the new job and dealing with her mom just might crack it, especially dealing with the fire department's other new hire: handsome, caring Rookie. She can't even use his name, she's so attracted to him. Way to lose the job you really need, way to lose the distance you really need, way to get into trouble. Cassie is doing her best to live as an adult, but she has some growing up to do (don't we all, even as we age). Firefighters deal with life and death all the time, but Cassie gets new insights into what can really ruin your life and what can save it. Heart and humor override the drama in this story, making it a fun read. With issues of life and death, fate and forgiveness, that's hard to pull off. Recommended! (I received an Advance Readers copy from St. Martin's for review.)


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