Troubles by J.G. Farrell *****

My grandfather emigrated from Ireland when he was about 18 years old, came over on a ship in the 1920's.  His older brother was already here in the Midwest, & after he met my grandmother & settled down he opened a bar & grill.  He died when my mom was in her early 20's, before she'd even met my dad.  So I never met the man, but his presence has loomed large in my life none the less.  St. Pat's Day is always celebrated & I grew up hearing the usual stories about how awful it was in Ireland when he left & how the British were just devils over there.  Don't get me wrong, my family wasn't ever very political in regards to Ireland, but I think that idolizing of the IRA was pretty normal in the US back in the day. 

Troubles will have to go down as one of the most memorable books I've ever read.  I know for a fact that the characters will stay with me for a lifetime.  And most importantly it has forced me to look at Ireland in a different way, in a way that takes some of the righteous, rosy sheen off of it.

The year is 1919 & British Major Brendan Archer has just been released from the hospital with wounds he'd received fighting in The Great War.  He doesn't have any family left except an aged aunt, & maybe a fiancee...he's not sure.  He kissed the girl, Angela, when on leave in 1916 at a resort in England & she's written him quite faithfully the whole time ever since.  With no where else to go & much to forget, he decides to visit her in Ireland at the decaying resort her father owns:  The Majestic.
I'm not much of one for symbolism in literature--I know it's there, but I hate analyzing things that much.  But it's hard to ignore the symbolic people of this book.  The Major is the Young Englishman, the one that is reasonable & understands the inequality of living in Ireland at this turbulent time. 
Edward Spencer, Angela's father, is Old England personified.  He thinks the Catholic majority is barely better than animals, ignorant & useless.  He uses them, & is totally surprised when he finds that they have also used him.
Sarah Devlin, a local girl & friend of Angela's, is Ireland.  She is Catholic, quick-witted, at turns very charming & very cruel. 
The symbolism doesn't stop there-The Majestic itself is dying like the English in Ireland.  The vegetation trying to take over the whole building, but there is always a reminder that it was there.
I think the most important thing that has struck me about this book is the way that Ireland back then was populated by two kinds of people who both considered themselves Irish--the Catholic "natives" & the Protestant "usurpers".  Usurpers that had been there for over 400 years, yet were still separate.  They were a massive part of the society of Ireland for those 400 years, but their role was suddenly & violently removed back in the 1920's. 
I see an Ireland that was full of conflict by choice & bigotry.  It was, & while I was growing up it still was, nothing better than the conflict of Israel & Palestine.  I think because I'm American, that I was raised on the story that the "Old Country" was a wonderful place but for the damned Brits, that I'm surprised by the realization that neither side was "right".  Childish, I know, but sometimes it takes awhile to learn the full story.
A most excellent book, with far more to offer than what I can write here.  I recommend it to all.

Fall of Giants by Ken Follett ****

I'm a sucker for a good historical fiction novel, and this is one!  It follows 5 families (one Welsh, one Russian, one American, one Brit and one German) from the turn of the century to just after WWI, showing how their stories meet and part while they live in those turbulent times.  Now you know there are going to be a lot of characters when you have to have a list of them in the front of the book, but these are even organized by nationality and sometimes even by job.  And I'm so glad Ken Follett did that, because I'm one of those people that has a hard time remembering who's who. 

It's a big, sweeping book, and Follett is planing of following it with two more just like it, since it says on the front cover that this is book one of The Century Trilogy.  I think it's fascinating to see how war brings very different people together that would never have met and creates a new reality that our ancestors would be rather surprised to learn about (for example:  both of my husband's grandparents never would have met each other without WWII happening).  So I can't wait for the next book, which will undoubtedly deal with WWII and how the same characters and their children experience it. 

Thanks Ken Follett for another great read!

East of Eden by John Steinbeck ****

I thought I'd turn to a classic for my next book. I've read some of Steinbeck's works, my favorites being Cannery Row & Of Mice and Men. I'd seen the movie of East of Eden with James Dean about 15 years ago and I couldn't remember any of it except that JD played an angst-ridden teen, angry at the world. So it was really all new to me.

This was a retelling of the Cain and Able story, set in the Salinas Valley of California at the turn of the last century. There were many themes explored by Steinbeck, but I think my favorite is whether humans have the ability to choose their own destiny. Even though you have tendencies given to you by your parents, can you be yourself and choose your own path?

Cal and Aron are twin brothers who both want their father's love and approval. But only sweet-natured Aron seems to get it. Cal is smart, crafty, and loyal. Yet somehow the things he does to gain his father's attention only seem to offend his dad, while Aron can do no wrong.

The story is more than this, though. It also deals with the boys' mother, a woman who has something missing from inside her. She doesn't seem capable of love and only uses those around her to get what she wants. After giving birth to the twins she leaves her husband and enters the oldest profession in a nearby town. The boys are told their mother is dead, and without the loving ministrations of their father's hired housekeeper, a Chinese-American man named Lee, they surely wouldn't have made it to adulthood.

Lee is a philosopher by nature and it is through his musings that Steinbeck explores his ideas on the meaning of life and man's ability to control his own destiny. I was very disappointed to see that his character was totally lost from the movie version that I'd seen. I knew I didn't remember a Chinese cook in the movie, but just hoped I'd forgotten. It seems a real shame that that opportunity was missed, but then again the movie was made in 1955, just two years after the end of the Korean War. At that point in American history, China was not seen as a "friendly" and unfortunately that fear was transferred to the big screen.

I've noticed that Steinbeck doesn't write very nicely about women in general and this book was no exception, with Cathy/Kate being an icy whore. But he tries to redeem that by creating Abra, the love interest of both Cal and Aron. She is everything Cathy is not and is a mother-figure to Aron, while something more to Cal.

Overall, the book was good though long. I like Of Mice and Men more, but I can't bring myself to read that book anymore since having a son with a developmental disability. Dog and I went to see it performed as a play about 3 years ago and we both left in tears after the first act. It's a very good story, but it hits too close to home for me anymore. If you have never read Steinbeck I recommend it as his best work in my opinion.

Three Day Road by Joseph Boyden *****

Yes, I've finally read another book. Not sure why I had the dry spell, but I'm glad it's over.

This is one of those books that haunts you for quite awhile, in fact parts of it may haunt me forever. It's amazing to me how images that form in your mind when reading can be the hardest to get out of it--things that you never saw, but feel like you did.

I heard of this book on a blog I follow, Half Soled Boots (Shan is very good at concisely describing the books she reads on there, so if you get a chance please check it out. And if you like knitting, she's the gal for you!). It sounded interesting, & since my library didn't have it & I've been wanting to try out the inter library loan function online, it worked for me.

Xavier & Elijah are two young Canadian Indian young men who join the army so they can go fight in WWI. They're both excellent shots, & so become sharp shooters. The story is about them, & about Xavier's aunt back home, Niska, who still lives in the wild as their ancestors did.

The scenes that haunt me are those of the WWI battlefields. I've seen a few movies showing the hell that went on over in Europe during the Great War, but as I said above, the images my own mind conjured up from reading the descriptions of the atrocities committed in the name of war will always be there.

I think that's the sign of a great author--not whether I like the plot or not, but whether I'm stuck with the images they somehow gave me in my head. I've read quite a few books that I honestly didn't like, but which were able to snake their way into my subconscious & now lie there waiting for some small thing to hatch them out again.