Books

Finished:

Lisey's Story by Stephen King - Lisey is the recent widow of a famous author. While the story is a suspenseful ghost story, bordering on sci-fi, it is also a meditation on grief and loss that anyone who has ever lost someone can identify with. I was a little bit slow getting into it, but by the time I was a few chapters in, I couldn't put it down. Just a side note: the physical book is beautiful. Under the plain red cover is a psychedelic tropical scene that fades from black and white to full color. For the week that it was on my desk, I got multiple questions and comments each day.

The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield - a Jane Eyre type gothic novel set in England. The plot is delightfully improbable and the text is full of references to 18th and 19th century British fiction. The plot occasionally loses itself, and the author could have cut the ending down by a few pages, but the author is extremely skillful at keeping up the gothic atmosphere. This is the perfect book to read on a rainy day with a cup of tea.

The Memory Keeper's Daughter by Kim Edwards - Norah Henry gives birth to twins in 1964 in the middle of a snowstorm. Her husband (a doctor) and his nurse are the only other people present. One of the babies is perfectly healthy, but the other is born with Downs syndrome. The husband gives the Downs baby to the nurse to take to an institution, but instead she takes the baby to raise as her own in another city. In the meantime, Norah believes her second child is dead. The story follows both families over the next quarter century. The book is light, fluffy, predictable, and utterly forgettable.

In process:

The End of Faith by Sam Harris - I am reading this on Crystal's recommendation. It's an indictment of religious faith in general, and specifically of religious moderates. I find myself mostly agreeing with the arguments and the general premise of the book, but I wish the author would not harp so much on Islam. His American audience is already familiar with what Islamic extremists can do, and tend to think of Muslims as Other. More of an impact might be made by analysing the effects of Christianity, the largest religion in this country. In any case, when the author begins ranting about Muslims, he starts sounding less than reasonable, and I tend to tune him out.

Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea by Charles Seife - part of the trend toward micro histories in recent years (see Salt, Stiff, Cod, Pi, etc.), Zero follows the history of a single mathematical concept from prehistory to the present. I have never conceived of numbers outside of a number line with zero in the middle, so it is hard to wrap my mind around the concept of the number zero being a controversy. The history of how mathematics, and specifically numbers, developed in different societies is fascinating. Realizing the giant leap forward that is involved in using zero as a placeholder in numbers (rather than using aggregate numbers, such as Roman numerals), was incredible. I'm only a third of the way through, but I'm already recommending it to anyone who will listen

Up next:

Word Freak by Stefan Fatsis - A foray into the world of competitive Scrabble. I come from a family of very dedicated Scrabble players, and I love to play myself, so this should be interesting.

Brick Lane by Monica Ali - a novel about a Bangladeshi woman in an arranged marriage who emigrates to England. I'm not sure where this book came from, but I found it on my bookshelf the other day and it looked interesting.