Warrior's Road and Others:Road through Time at the Atwater Library

Hope to see you at 12:30 p.m. Thursday October 12 at the Atwater Library when I'll be talking about Road through Time: The Story of Humanity on the Move (University of Regina Press.) This image of Persian charioteers (as imagined in the 19th century) will be one of those I'll show as I talk about the first roads, warrior's roads, modern roads, and where they may be leading us now.

Summer Reading Report: Commonwealth by Anne Patchett and Swing Time by Zadie Smith Top So Far

The summer is marching on, and I've begun to start thinking of the book groups I'll lead in the fall. Indeed, I've begun reading the books on the lists that I hadn't read before (always risky to put something on a list that you haven't already read, but sometimes that's unavoidable.)

So far I've finished Anne Patchett's Commonwealth, which I find quite wonderful.  A very sharp rendering of people's difficult lives, which nevertheless leaves one in a positive frame of mind.  Very hard to do.

Zadie Smith's Swing Time isn't on any of my group's lists,  but I told myself I should read it anyway.  It was a chore at first--the narrator's involvement in the glam world of a Madonna-like vedette  left me cold at first.  The sequences in Africa seemed also to be transcriptions of notes taken while on a travel-writing assignment.  But by the end, I found myself wrapped up in the story, pleased with the spin Smith put on the the world of the Bitch Goddess Success, and nodding my head over the portrayal of women who try with mixed success to escape poverty and lack of control of their lives.

However, my mid-summer literary epiphany came a couple of weeks ago when we were travelling with kids and grandkids in the North West. One of the grandkids favourite stories is that of The Great Antonio, a Montreal strong man, by Elise Gravel.  He pulled buses with his teeth and other feats of strength.  Gravel's illustrations are delightful, and obviously made a big impact on not-quite-five Thomas.

When we were doing a little morning walk-about near Grand Coulee dam on our recent trip, he got very excited, pointing toward the hilltops and talking about the Grand Antonio.  The adults couldn't figure out what he meant, but then it dawned on us: the high tension pilons carrying electricity from the dam.  They look a little like someone flexing his muscles, I agree.

You could probably do a nice turn on that: how electricity makes the world run, and how it magnifies the strength of all of us.  But I think I'll just be delighted at a little boy's imagination. 

Books to Read This Summer in Preparation for Next Year's Book Groups

Okay, the booklists for the five book groups I lead in Montreal libraries are all set up. Here's what we'll be reading in the English groups, just in case you want to get a head start.

In no particular order:

The Heart, AKA Mend the Living by Maylis de Kerangal

Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro

The Orange Grove by Larry Tremblay

The Signature of All Things by Elizabeth Gilbert

The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen

Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson

Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage by Huraki Murakami

The Door by Magda Szabo

Commonwealth by Anne Patchett

The Light between the Oceans by M. L. Stedman

Sweetland by Michael Crummey

The Girl Who Was Saturday night by Heather O'Neill

The Miniaturist by Jessie Burton

Three Day Road by Joseph Boyden

Doing the Heart Good by Neil Bissoondath

Emancipation Day by Wayne Grady

The Signature of All Things by Elizabeth Gilbert

The Magic Strings of Frankie Presto by Mitch Albom

The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barberry

The Golden Son by Shilpi Somaya Gowda

Suite Française by Irène Némirovsky (Tr. Sandra Smith)

Doing the Heart Good by Neil Bissoondath

Our Souls at Night by Kent Haruf

Brooklyn, a novel by Colm Toibín

The Noise of Time by Julian Barnes

The Marriage of Opposites by Alice Hoffman

To the End of the Land by David Grossman

Hag-seed: Shakespeares' The Tempest Retold by Margaret Atwood

The Round House by Louise Erdrich

Et dans le groupe francophone:

Doerr, Anthony Toute la lumière que nous ne pouvons voir

Kerangal, Maylis Réparer les vivants

Arcan, Nelly Putain

Grenier, Daniel L'année la plus longue

Morrisson, Toni Beloved

Erdrich, Louise Dans le silence du vent

Schmitt, Eric- Emmanuel La part de l'autre

Barbeau- Lavalette, Anaïs La femme qui fuit

Dickner, Nicolas Six degrés de liberté

Goodreads Giveaway: The Winners Announced!

The Goodreads Giveaway  for Road through Time: The Story of Humanity on the Move ended on the weekend.  Here are the winners: Kal Adler, Steven Telly and Muayad Aldarweesh.  They should be getting their copies soon.

And for those of you who didn't win, but who would like to read the book anyway, it should be in any good independent bookshop and here are links to on-line places: McNally Robinson, Chapters-Indigo,  Amazon.ca , and Amazon.com,

Road through Time: Come Celebrate Its Release!

The box with the first copies of Road through Time arrived last week, and this morning I went looking for goodies to share with my friends who will be with us on Thursday when we do the official launch.

So I'm hoping there will be lots of people at the launch.  And for those who can't make it, I'll also be taking part in  a panel at the Blue Metropolis International Literary Festival on the following Thursday, April 27.  It's called Latin America Packaged in English, and I'll contribute some stories about my adventures in Peru and, particularly, Brazil. 

Then on Saturday, April 29, I'll be at Librairie Clio's Authors for Indies event from 1:30 to 3:30 p.m.  It'll be a chance to talk informally about the book and about books in general. 

Win a Copy of Road through Time: The Story of Humanity on the Move

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Road Through Time

by Mary Soderstrom

Giveaway ends May 06, 2017.

See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter Giveaway

Hearts, Valentines and Maylis de Kerengal

It's been quite a while since I've posted here--many, many things going on, including much reading for my various projects.  But today is a quiet Sunday, so I want to catch up.  First up here's an appreciation of one of the best novels I've read in years.

The illustration is a Valentine  heart, made with a not-too-steady hand in Photoshop.  Nice to know that I don't do much cardiac surgery, right?

As it happens, though, I've been reading the wonderful novel by Maylis de Kerengal, variously called Réparer les vivants (in French) or Mending the Living (translation by Jennifer Moore) or The Heart translation by Sam Taylor.  In it, a young man dies and his heart and other organs are donated to others.  Sounds gruesome, but it is exalting.  The French is poetic, evocative and engrossing, while the translations (why there are two, I haven't been able to determine, but both are quite good in their own way) carry the reader along through all the agony of the young man's family and medical professionals who will see that he lives on in others.

In France, organ donation is the default situation: a person must opt out, or it is assumed that he or she has agreed to have organs donated.  In North America, the reverse is the norm, so that unless one has specifically signed a statement approving donation, they won't be.  I'd always been a bit ambivalent about this, and while I've signed the statement on my driver's license agreeing to donation, I had no strong position.  After reading the novel, I'm far more positive.  Read it, and check out where you can sign up. In Canada: here.  In the US: here.