Women in Translation

This week’s challenge was to read a collection of poetry in translation on a theme other than love. 

Turning to Powell’s, my trusty purveyor of used books, I discovered a women in translation sale. Sold.

Liu Xia’s collection of poems, Empty Chairs, spans the years 1983-2013. Under house arrest after her husband, now deceased, was imprisoned, she is described as a poet who has “turned from a bird into a tree, her feathers becoming white and withered.”

From “One Bird Then Another”:

Back then,

we were always talking

about the bird. Not knowing

where it came from – the bird,

the bird – it brought us

warmth and laughter.

From “How It Stands”:

Why draw a tree?

I like how it stands.

Aren’t you tired of being a tree your whole life?

Even when exhausted, I want to stand. 

Shore Excursion

Recently, I dropped off my brother and his family at a Seattle port for an Alaskan cruise. I started feeling a little claustrophobic seeing the masses of people queuing up to board with two to three suitcases a piece. I kept seeing the images of this disaster as I took in the truly massive ship with lifeboats ringing the sides in plain sight. My brother and his family, by the way, had a wonderful time.

Therefore, I was curious to pick up Do Not Become Alarmed by Maile Meloy when I saw the words “holiday cruise” and “misfortune” in its synopsis.

Liv and Nora are cousins, as close as sisters. Since Nora is having a bad time of it after her mom dies, Liv decides their two families should go on a Central American cruise for Christmas.

Skeptical at first, the adults start to enjoy themselves.  Befriending a glamourous Argentinian couple Camila and Gunther, relaxing while the kids play in Kids' Club or swim with their new friends, Liv congratulates herself for arranging the trip. But even the ship’s myriad amusements grow to be too much of the same. At the next port, the moms decide to take the kids on a zip-lining adventure with a local guide while the dads golf at a club with one of Gunther’s friends.

When the tire on the guide’s car blows out, everyone is a little rattled, but unharmed. Trying to salvage the day, the guide, Pedro, offers to take them to a local swimming hole. Liv makes sure she has her son Sebastian’s insulin pump and the sunscreen, and the kids and moms trek down to the water.

What happens next is a series of bad decisions that are equally thrilling and frustrating in the reading. Just like you might yell at the young girl on the screen not to go in the basement, you’ll want to tell the kids to stay put, don’t get in the van, don’t go upstairs, don’t get on the train.

Meanwhile, Noemi who has been living with her grandmother in Ecuador, finds out one morning her uncle has arrived to take her to New York to her parents. Their journey intersects with that of the missing kids, juxtaposing the despair of the poor with that of the privileged.

The novel evokes Ann Patchett’s  Bel Canto, provoking empathy for both kidnappers and captives. It’s only fitting that Patchett has given this novel a glowing book jacket review, “smart and thrilling and impossible to put down.” Exactly. 

Sibling Rivalry

I’m reliving my childhood. My tormentor, aka younger brother, loved to sneak into my room and string my Fozzie Bear stuffed animal onto the cord of my ceiling fan. I would turn red with range, only fueling his fun, and plot my revenge.

My daughter (who just turned twelve) prefers screaming bloody murder when she finds that her carefully constructed toyscape has been destroyed or her phone’s wallpaper has been changed by her little brother.

Most of the time, like my brother and I did, they do get along and play well together. One of the most enjoyable conversations I overhear while they’re in the backseat of the car is a shared love of certain book series.

Roald Dahl books fly back and forth from their rooms at bedtime. The Giver Quartet is on its way. So far, my son has only read the first one, but my daughter has been encouraging him to read the others.

The following two series, however, are ones they’ve both read, and argued about, recounted favorite scenes from, and figured how to reserve at the school library.

Myth-O-Mania by Kate McMullan

The nine books in this series are narrated by Hades, King of the Underworld. Trying to dispel the “myths” (pun intended) promulgated by his brother Zeus, he retells each story with his own unique twist. My son’s favorite is Say Cheese, Medusa! My daughter likes Phone Home, Persephone!

The True Story of… by Liesl Shurtliff

The three books (so far) of this series are Rump, Jack, and Red.  “It’s like you took a fairy tale and modernized it, pretty much,” my daughter said. But more exciting. And funnier. My son recommends Rump. My daughter’s favorite is Jack. 

Vamos, patojos

One of my high school Spanish teachers showed this movie in her class. Made in 1983, it follows the journey of a brother and sister fleeing their homes in Guatemala to try and make a new life in Los Angeles. It was the first time I thought about what it might mean to start over without family support or even legal documents.  

I never thought almost 30 years later my daughter would be reading a book, published and set in 2016, that follows a similar premise, but with a cast of much younger characters.

In The Only Road by Alexandra Diaz, Jaime Rivera and his cousin Ángela are being threatened by the gang that killed Angela’s brother Miguel. Their family members scrape up enough money to send them from their small town in Guatemala to a relative in the United States. Ángela is fifteen. Jaime is twelve years old. 

Jaime, an avid artist, sketches their perilous journey aboard pick-up trucks, buses, and freight trains as they cross into Mexico and make the long journey north to the Rio Grande. They encounter other children along the way traveling in pairs or alone. Pooling their resources, they figure out who to trust. They pray they won’t be separated, lost, or even killed. The kindness of strangers puts food in their bellies. Veterans of the journey offer advice for survival.

Perilous and eye-opening, the novel introduces us to fictional characters who, unfortunately, are based on the stories of actual young people. Kids who fear for their lives. Kids who have no choice but to try for a better life.

To find more social justice books for kids, click here.

Profusion of Tropical Life

I’ve never been on a boat smaller than a ferry or larger than a speedboat. Therefore, sailing from Long Island to Australia on a fifty five foot catamaran sailboat is probably something I’ll only ever read about. Reading this week’s challenge, travel memoir Black Wave by John and Jean Silverwood, pretty much ensures that.

Experienced sailors, John and Jean, set out to fulfill a life-long dream when they boarded their new sailboat, the Emerald Jane, along with their four kids (ages 14, 12, 7, and 3).

Encounters with pirates, John’s alcoholism, and shady dock dwellers were balanced out by amazing sunrises, swims with dolphins, and lessons only the sea could teach their children about navigation and hard work.

Little did they know their trip would be abruptly shattered by a coral reef near the Polynesian Islands. Jean tells the story from her perspective and astutely begins with the page-turning event of the journey – the shipwreck.

Knowing how the trip ends, but not the outcome, I was turning pages at a furious clip.  I found the description of the trip’s preparation fascinating and enjoyed (vicariously) the idea of living on a sailboat and living off the fruits of various islands. (Homeschooling and sharing close quarters with five other people seems less appealing.) 

Despite the nail-biting disaster that befalls them, the book does have a happy ending – a must for an armchair traveler that doesn’t have the solace of a pina colada to soothe frayed nerves. 

Braiding Sweetgrass

Botanist and member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation Robin Wall Kimmerer writes about humanity’s damaged relationship to the natural world in Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants.

“If time could run backward, like a film in reverse, we would see this mess reassemble itself into lush green hills and moss-covered ledges of limestone. The streams would run back up the hills to the springs and the salt would stay glittering in underground rooms.” 

“Never take the first plant you find, as it might be the last—and you want that first one to speak well of you to the others of her kind.” 

“The land is the real teacher. All we need as students is mindfulness.” 

“We need acts of restoration, not only for polluted waters and degraded lands, but also for our relationship to the world. We need to restore honor to the way we live, so that when we walk through the world we don’t have to avert our eyes with shame, so that we can hold our heads up high and receive the respectful acknowledgment of the rest of the earth’s beings.” 

Just as I finished reading Kimmerer’s book, I came across this article which only reinforces her thesis. 

Summer Reads

The high temperature lately has been 77 degrees, which counts as sweltering in the Seattle area. However, the sun is shining. Brightly! Consistently! So midway through July, I’ve conceded it’s summer.

These books have just become available on my Overdrive wait list, and so by default, comprise a summer reading list of sorts. Whether historical or contemporary, fiction or memoir, they all captured my attention and provided the most essential quality of any good summer read – escape.

First Comes Love by Emily Giffin

Rules of Civility by Amor Towles

Who thought this was a good idea? By Alyssa Mastromonaco

Victoria by Daisy Goodwin

We were the Lucky Ones by Georgia Hunter

Need a second (or fifth) opinion?

NPR (adults)

NPR (kids)

Washington Post

Real Simple