BookReports

Alexandra Fuller writes a sad tough story about a real-life hyper-active, big-hearted young Western roughneck tragically killed in an all-too-common gas rig accident. She brings to life the folks who make their meager perilous livings in the fuel mining industry, speaking in their style and portraying also the magnificent environment they love to hunt and fish in.

If you have not already read it, hie thee to a library or the Amazon website and get hold of Barbara Kingsolver’s latest novel, The Lacuna. Wonderful Mexican characters (don’t know how she gets into their heads and styles of speech) and scenes.

But much more than that. She artfully advocates the causes of The People (to which our government pays lip service while serving the corporations and the wealthy, like most governments) by bringing to life Trotsky and family taking refuge in Mexico and his assassination by a Stalinist agent, the McCarthy anti-communist campaign and throughout the damnable role played by yellow journalism, the unfairness of war waged by the rich and powerful but suffered by the poor soldiers and their families,all cleverly conveyed by a writer who purports to be writing non-political Mexican historical novels. She also brings to life Diego Rivera and his artist wife and the naive hopes of the world communist movement, corrupted by Stalin and demonized by the Cold War and McCarthyism.

Kingsolver artfully speaks to our time while purporting to be writing history.

Isabel Allendes’ tale of a powerful woman in Spain’s exploration and settlement of Chile is of necessity mythical but it is grounded in historical, often brutal and shocking, detail.  Ines becomes the mistress of Pedro de Valdivia, indefatigable conquistador, who never stops battling the equally determined Chilean Indians of Southern Chile.  Later she marries a nobel spirited junior officer to Valdivia who becomes governor for a time and elevates her to the status and possessions of a governor’s wife.

Throughot it is Ines who copes with the survival needs of the colonists from food to medical aid while the men tend fo battles and politics.  The unbelievable hardships of these new world invaders as well as the tribes they exterminate is made clear as well as the ruthless warring of the Pizarro brothers in Peru.

The Swedish writer Marianne Fredriksson helps us experience the problems and prejudices both toward and by immigrants in this story of an unlikely friendship between Swedish born Inge and Chilean emigre Mira. What brings them together is a common love of flowers; what keeps them together is their feminine experiences with men and life in general

All new to me were the insights into the Cilean revolution and brutal suppression abetted by our CIA assassination of legitimate reform presiident Allende. Also the bigotry of the Chilean upper classes toward the lower.

The Swedish writer Marianne Fredriksson helps us experience the problems and prejudices both toward and by immigrants in this story of an unlikely friendship between Swedish born Inge and Chilean emigre Mira. What brings them together is a common love of flowers; what keeps them together is their feminine experiences with men and life in general

All new to me were the insights into the Cilean revolution and brutal suppression abetted by our CIA assassination of legitimate reform presiident Allende. Also the bigotry of the Chilean upper classes toward the lower.

Marianne Friedriksson is a Swedish writer who opens our eyes not only to the gulf between ent immigrants (from Chile to Sweden) and local residents but also to the barriers to understanding of different temperaments and social classes..  Here Inge and Mira become friends despite the above differences, and their families intermingle with surprising results.

She also explores women’s experiences of lust and love and the frequent confusion of one with the other, as well as the exploitation of women’s naivety by men.  Inge’s love for her ex-husband is only dissipated when she learns he was a child abuser and rapist.  Mira’s worshipful memories of her guerilla-leader lover are only expunged by the revelation that he raised funds for the revolution from her and many other susceptible women.

Finally, this book awakens remorse in the American reader for our governmen’s part in arranging the murder of Allende, a democratically elected president, and our support of the cruel dictator Pinochet, who was eventually accused of genocide.  We are horrified by the rapes and executions  his forces  perpetrated.

Harriet Doerr has certainly lived in Mexica, and as I have visited San Miguel and lived in Lima, Peru, I found this little gem of a novel particularly appealing.  Painting with a spare brush she  brings to life the tiny town of Amapolis and a handful of American and other outlanders who briefly take up residence there.

This is also the end-of-life story of an 83-year old woman, Ursula Bowles,  with whom I could relate. And there is an appealing  ending for a divorced woman who is surprised by a happy reunion with her ex-husband.

Ray Bradbury’s new, for the most part, small book of short stories is perhaps all too reminiscent of Dandelion Wine and other early favorites. Many are focussed on death (The Graveyard, I Got Something you Ain’t Got)  The language is at times too self-consciously poetic.  Some are not so macabre and lead to a good resolution, like the relationship between a teacher and student in These Things Happen.  Most grisly is the narrative by a serial killer in At Midnight in the Month of June.  On the whole, the abnormal and the dark side are Bradbury’s domain.

Lewis Robinson has written an appropriately enigmatic novel about a coastal Maine family: young Bennie eventually comes to understand his intensely guarded older brother, who comes under suspicion following  the  mysterious disappearance in a blizzard of  one of the contestants in  a paint gun fight.

Water dog is a nickname for their pet  Labrador  as well as  the father and three children of this family, the latter trying to heal themselves of the sudden loss by heart attack  of their much loved father and biathlon coach. The title fits the setting on the shore of the wintry ocean from and around which so many of the inhabitants make their living.

With the help of friends and despite the malign intentions of an invidious small town cop,  the three young people make progress toward maturity.