A few years ago, I read and deeply enjoyed My Jewish Year: 18 Holidays, One Wondering Jew by Abigail Pogrebin. She wrote about her year of observing every single Jewish holiday (having not previously observed most of them), and what she learned from this, about Judaism, herself, and her place in Judaism. It’s a really neat book, a great primer on the Jewish holidays, and I appreciated her takes on the holidays I was fuzzy on. So when I learned she had written a book interviewing Jewish celebrities about being Jewish, I knew I wanted to read more of her writing. I put Stars of David: Prominent Jews Talk About Being Jewish (Broadway Books, 2005) on my TBR and was fully prepared to request it from interlibrary loan, but wouldn’t you know, I ran into a copy of it at the used bookstore earlier this month (first time I stopped there in over a year!), and it just so happened to follow me home.
Each chapter in Stars of David focuses on a different well-known Jewish personality, and Ms. Pogrebin questions them on what being Jewish means to them. Are they observant? (Most aren’t.) Why or why not? What have their experiences been with antisemitism? What does being Jewish mean if you’re not observant? How has it shaped you and your life, your personality, your family? What are you hopes for your children, your grandchildren, in terms of Judaism? What do you think the Jewish future looks like?
While this book is by now a bit dated in terms of the people she interviewed (a depressing number of the people she interviewed have since passed on; many are no longer as active in public life as they were when these interviews took place), it’s still an interesting take on the many, many ways one can be Jewish. There are a handful of people who are in some way observant and who are a bit grumpy with those who aren’t, or who at least don’t even know what it is they’ve rejected; others roll their eyes at the idea of engaging with the more religious aspects of Judaism (which is a lot different from Christianity; the phrase Judeo-Christian gets thrown around a lot, but I haven’t met a single Jewish person who appreciates its use, because the two are just so far apart in terms of belief, action, thoughts about what God is, and so much more). There are political figures, actors and directors and television personalities, people from the financial industry, athletes, musicians, Broadway stars, and more.
If you’re my age (40!) or older, these are the celebrities you grew up with and heard about constantly on television, and it’s a nice look back at…well, most of those voices. (I can’t say I loved the interview with Dr. Laura Schlessinger- remember her? I’m sorry if you do- who makes sure to weaponize her Judaism just as she does everything else, and then of course whines when people point out how repulsive that is. *yawn*) It’s a lovely look into a part of their lives that you may not have spent much time considering, about a part of themselves they find meaningful in a variety of different ways, and how they express that part.
Language is complicated. Translation is often far more of an art than a science, and it’s easy to get things wrong- wayyyyyyyyyy wrong- and even more so with documents that are ancient and don’t conform to today’s standards of grammar, syntax, and punctuation. Nowhere is this more evident than in matters of Biblical translation, and when I learned about the existence of The Bible Doesn’t Say That: 40 Biblical Mistranslations, Misconceptions, and Other Misunderstandings by Dr. Joel M. Hoffman (Thomas Dunne Books, 2016), my curiosity was piqued. What else could I learn about the foibles of improper translation and the misconceptions that have become canon?
In the tradition of Bart Ehrman’s Misquoting Jesus: The Story Behind Who Changed the Bible and Why, though written in a much less academic style, Dr. Hoffman shines light on forty separate biblical ideas that aren’t quite what the general public (and often the very religious) think they are. Sometimes the translations are wrong. Sometimes there’s no direct translation, so something gets a little lost and the meaning is vague or unclear. Occasionally, ideas have been twisted (sometimes to fit an agenda, sometimes due to being passed down the line like a game of Telephone- remember that one?). The most famous Psalm paints a picture of God as a shepherd, but it’s not quite the gentle minder that we think of today. Mistranslations of the Ten Commandments hang in public spaces across the US. Most Jews know that the complete laws of kashrut (keeping kosher) don’t come from the Bible, but a lot of Christians are apparently unaware of that. Forty separate chapters illustrate how difficult and contentious parsing out the true textual meaning can be, and how easy it is to get things wrong.
Never stooping to talk down to his audience, Dr. Hoffman explains the hows and whys of Biblical translation and the shortcomings of language in a way that will have readers questioning what else they’ve misunderstood or been misinformed about. While some of his examples may seem just this side of nitpicking in terms of translation, most chapters show more serious transgressions. Both Hebrew and Greek contain concepts that English doesn’t necessarily have easy translations for, and time and time again, the best attempts of multiple translators have led to serious misunderstandings. This is nothing if not a fascinating study in how mistranslations can shape civilizations and cause others to shape their own lives in ways they wouldn’t have otherwise.
If you’re interested in the subject of Biblical translation, The Bible Doesn’t Say That is likely right up your alley. On a personal level, there wasn’t a *ton* I hadn’t come across in my previous reading, but his style is open and friendly and presents the information in a way that challenges the reader to think, which is something I appreciate in an author. He’s never confrontational in tone, merely informative- hey, when we’ve been wrong, we’ve been wrong, and it’s important to admit that!- and that makes this a really enjoyable read.
Opera! I enjoy opera. I haven’t yet been able to see one in person (or even a performance streamed live to theaters from the Metropolitan Opera! Those look so cool), but maybe one day. I ran into Mad Scenes and Exit Arias: The Death of the New York City Opera and the Future of Opera in America by Heidi Waleson (Metropolitan Books, 2018) in the library a few years ago and thought it looked interesting. I’m always wanting to learn more about the subjects I enjoy, and here was this fascinating-looking book on the New Books shelf. I didn’t have the time or mental space for it right then, so onto the list it went…and there it sat. Until my latest library trip.
New York City Opera opened in 1943 and was known as ‘The People’s Opera,’ the alternative to the flashier and more expensive Metropolitan Opera. Serving a lot of European immigrants who had enjoyed this flashy art form in their home countries, the NYCO struggled with finances almost from the beginning. Make no mistake, opera is monstrously expensive to stage; from scenery and costumes to paying the performers and musicians, it’s nearly impossible to run an opera organization and remain comfortably and regularly in the black. Subsidies, grants, and charitable donations are vital, but NYCO ran at a deficit almost all the time.
Year after year of struggling leadership and desperate financial moves that only kicked the problems a little bit down the line doomed the organization, but it limped along until filing for bankruptcy in 2013. New leadership cropped up and brought NYCO back in 2016, but its long-term success remains to be seen, especially in light of the financial troubles brought into existence by the Covid-19 pandemic, which has crippled the entire arts industry.
So, this book wasn’t exactly what I was expecting. I was thinking it was more of a history of the New York City Opera, that I was going to be reading stories of demanding divas, scenery that malfunctioned, performances that triumphed and flopped, chorus members who bickered and requested bigger roles, and costume troubles. Nope. This was almost entirely all about the financial troubles of the NYCO. There were few stories about individual performers or performances, very little about the arts side of the organization. Just finances. I started to question why this book was shelved with the books about music in my library and not in the business section.
If you’ve ever wondered about the difficulties of running a major arts organization in a country that views culture as optional and something only for the privileged, this is probably the book you need, because it definitely illustrates how little America cares as a whole for cultural and artistic institutions such as opera (in Europe, arts organizations enjoy government subsidization, because the government understands that their commitment to the arts is a large part of what makes their countries so appealing and beautiful. That allows the artists to focus on their art forms and performances and not have to scramble for funding the majority of their time. This is absolutely not the case in the US).
Not quite the book I was expecting, and honestly, it got to be a bit of a slog. I don’t regret having read it, but I was really looking forward to more of a look into the people of the NYCO and not just its financial books. It’s definitely something that’ll stick with me, however; it’s given me a much deeper appreciation for the struggle American arts organizations face.
Pronouns are popping up all over: in social media bios, in our screennames on our nine million daily Zoom calls, in applications and various forms we’re asked to fill out (I just wrote out my pronouns in a volunteer application about fifteen minutes ago. LOVE that they asked). Odds are you’ve come across at least one person who uses what is thought of as a non-traditional pronoun; I know several in person and many more online who do. But is this really a new phenomenon? Not at all, says Dennis Baron in his study of the subject, What’s Your Pronoun?: Beyond He and She (Liveright, 2020). This went on my list as soon as I learned about its existence; I’m a bit of a language nerd, so the subject interested me, but I’m also interested in being the best ally I can, so I knew I needed to learn more.
English is seriously lacking in a common-gender pronoun. What’s commonly used is they/them, but grammar fascists have long had their issues with that. (Insert eyeroll.) This isn’t a new problem. Dennis Baron points out that what we think of as ‘alternative’ pronoun use in the US goes back to the 1780’s, and that’s only how far back we’ve been able to dig up written sources. And singular ‘they,’ as in ‘I saw someone at your house, but they ran off when they saw me’ has been in use since 1376, according to the Oxford English Dictionary. If you’re looking for a book to convince a family member that your pronoun use isn’t just some modern-day fancy, this will help you clarify points and back up your argument. (Not that you should have to; your choices about your identity and how you want to be addressed are valid regardless.)
While at times this book is a bit of an information dump, it’s interesting and informative, and it’s written in a jaunty, fun style that doesn’t exhaust the brain to take it all in. The struggle to use English in a way that suits our needs in terms of identity has been going on for a long time, and it’s chock-full to the brim with whiny, tantrum-throwing men who gasped as though someone had kicked their puppy when it was suggested that maybe women didn’t enjoy being referred to as the generic he (as in, ‘If a guest doesn’t enjoy steamed fish, he is welcome to order something else off the menu’). “Men in power accepted the generic masculine only when it didn’t require them to give up too much,” Mr. Baron states, and then presents this to the reader in example after infuriating example (He meant men in terms of rights, like who could vote, but it meant men AND women in terms of punishment. SUPER CONVENIENT, RIGHT?!!?!?? *ragescream*).
Language changes. Uses change. New words crop up. If you don’t think that’s true, try explaining the sentence ‘I downloaded the browser extension, but then my modem disconnected and I bluescreened’ to someone from 1950. What is eternal is respect and how we treat each other, and though it may take some practice to use pronouns that you aren’t necessarily familiar with, if you can remember to use a woman’s new last name when she gets married and changes it to her husband’s, you can also remember to refer to your friend’s kid or your co-worker as ‘them’ or ‘hir’ when you speak about them. It’s not hard, and it’s not new.
Dennis Baron has really shed a lot of light on how far back the struggle for a gender-neutral pronoun goes. I had no idea that ze, for example, traces back to 1864. And one of the most fascinating quotes I found in the book refers to ‘em, as in “The dogs are missing! We need to find ‘em!”:
‘…the informal ‘em, so common in speech, is not a reduced form of them, but a holdover from the old plural object form hem, with unpronounced h.’
Fascinating! I never knew that!
Lots of history and information and men throwing fits because they didn’t want to share society with women (seriously, dudes, get over it. Who raised you???), but you’ll learn a lot about the English language and its use throughout history. It’s really true that everything old is new again in terms of pronoun use. 😊
Imagine a world that seems pretty normal. It’s mostly like ours, with smart phones and computers and people enjoying coffee in cutesy little cafes…and then a drone whizzes by. And after that, a robot dog trots past you, careful to avoid the driverless taxi as it crosses the street. That robot dog is still new enough to the tech scene that a few people turn to stare. That’s the world Naomi Kritzer has created in her CatNet series and in which we find ourselves again in her second and latest book featuring Steph and friends, Chaos on CatNet (Tor Teen, 2021). I’ve gushed in the past about Naomi’s Catfishing on CatNetand Cat Pictures Please and Other Stories(which I read before I started blogging, but seriously, if you read *one* book I recommend, this is it, and I don’t even normally like short stories!), but man, she just keeps getting better and better.
Full disclosure: I’ve known Naomi since around 2002. We’ve been part of the same small online parenting group since then, but my reviews are entirely independent of that. I enjoyed but didn’t love her Fires of the Faithful, which was a little outside of my normal reading wheelhouse at the time- it’s well-written, but fantasy isn’t usually my thing. I’m telling you this so that you’re confident that my review is impartial enough to be trusted. These CatNet books are amazing.
Steph is back, finally settled down in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area with her mother, after a life on the run from her father. Her father is in prison, awaiting trial; things are going well, albeit long-distance, with her girlfriend Rachel; her friends from the CatNet Clowder, including sentient AI CheshireCat, are still supportive; and she’s starting a new school. There’s another new girl there as well. Nell has just left (somewhat unwillingly) the Christian cult she lived in with her mother, who has disappeared. She now lives with her father and his polyamorous wife and girlfriends- it’s a complicated situation, but Steph and Nell find a lot to bond over with their shared unconventional backgrounds.
Not all is well, though. The social media networks Steph and Nell are using are sending bizarre messages, asking them to complete strange tasks that increasingly cause Steph to suspect that these networks are being run by the other sentient AI out there- the one who isn’t her cat picture-loving friend, CheshireCat. CheshireCat shares her fears, and it’s starting to look like Nell’s former cult group (along with Nell’s mother) and Steph’s mother’s dangerous former business partner Rajiv may be involved as well. When the sentient AI-controlled networks begin causing riots and explosions in Minneapolist-St. Paul, will Steph, CheshireCat, and friends be able to intervene in time to stop the chaos from spreading across the country?
My synopsis doesn’t do this near-future YA thriller-with-excellent-queer-rep justice. This is serious edge-of-your-seat reading, one that I didn’t find stressful like I do most thrillers, just deeply intriguing. I blew through this book in less than twenty-four hours, and given my lack of reading time these days, you *know* that means it’s incredible. Steph is mature for her age- who wouldn’t be, after the life she’s led with her mother?- but she’s still subject to the longings of a teenager’s first experience with love. Nell shares in her awkwardness of having been raised in a deeply unconventional way, but hers is more acute, and she’s more wary than Steph. I really enjoyed watching the dynamics of their new friendship play out.
The Minneapolis-St.Paul area, or at least its weather, is as much of a character here as any human or sentient AI, as it features heavily during many of the book’s scenes. Steph and Nell are often out in brutally cold temperatures and this becomes a factor in a lot of their decisions. Nell’s former cult is also another huge part of the book that you know pulled me right in. I may have gasped when I got to that part (Naomi has a degree in religion, so various forms of this often appear in her stories. I love that I know this).
The sci-fi aspects of this aren’t over-the-top; I’m not a sci-fi person, but this was just straight-up interesting. It’s set in the near-future, where technology is just a little more advanced than what we have right now, and all that plays into the plot. It’s not so tech-y that I (who isn’t the most tech-y person out there) was confused, but the story was based in a reality that even I could imagine as stemming from the technology we have now. I never really saw myself as someone who would enjoy- actually LOVE- a series of books where a sentient AI is a main character, but CheshireCat is an utter delight, as is this book, and its companion.
You don’t need to have read Catfishing on CatNet to enjoy Chaos, but both books are so much fun and so enjoyable, why wouldn’t you? I highly recommend this whole series; you won’t regret it.
Finally! Finally, it’s warm out when I’m reading a book about foraging! Normally, it’s freezing and there are twenty feet of snow on the ground, a fact that never ceases to amuse me. Perhaps I’m just looking for a taste of warmer weather when that happens. This was more coincidence; Browsing Nature’s Aisles: A Year of Foraging for Wild Food in the Suburbs by Eric and Wendy Brown (New Society Publishers, 2013) had been on my TBR for quite some time and it was time to move it off of there. Thanks, interlibrary loan!
Eric and Wendy Brown, who live in suburban Maine, realized they wanted a more local, more sustainable way of life. They began to garden, they bought some chickens, they started to frequent their local farmer’s market. But they realized that this wasn’t enough, and that to supplement their diet, they needed to check out what nature was providing all around them for free. Starting with their own yard and branching out to the wide-open spaces around them, they began to learn the local plants that most people regarded as weeds or nuisances. Taking classes with urban foraging experts and instructors and learning from mycologists, they built up their confidence in identifying edible plants, fruits, roots, and mushrooms, and began to supplement their diet with items they foraged themselves.
This isn’t an instructional book. There are no, “Here are the plants that are safe to eat, here’s how you identify them and what you do with them once you’ve got them in your kitchen.” It’s the recounting of one couple’s adventures during a year of foraging in Maine. They talk about why they got started foraging (this part is a little doomsday-style depressing; it’s not necessarily inaccurate, just something to watch out for if you’re in a poor mood at the time) and their successes and failures, and all the reasons why urban foraging is a good idea. It’s not a bad story, but to be fully honest, I didn’t necessarily find anything new or inspiring in it, either.
I’m always impressed and a little bit baffled by people who live in the suburbs but who manage to find all sorts of wild-growing food. We have things like chickweed and common plantain and dandelions growing in our yard, of course, but there aren’t really stands of wild berries or apple trees growing nearby that are free for the taking. There are no empty fields where we can forage. All the forest preserves around us have signs all over explicitly stating that removing any kind of nature from the preserve is strictly forbidden. I’m very honestly unsure of where on earth we would find the kinds of things these authors are constantly stumbling across. There’s just not a lot of nature around us that we’re allowed to take things from, at least, not that I’m aware of. Maybe I’m just missing out. Our local community college did offer an evening prairie walk, pre-pandemic, where an instructor would walk with the participants and point out edible plants. I had planned on signing up for that, but, well, you know. I’m sure that’ll come back in 273489374923 years, when this is all over…
So this book was just okay for me. It wasn’t quite what I was expecting, and I didn’t find the writing to be terribly interesting. It wasn’t bad, by any means, but it was no Stalking the Wild Asparagus, either.
May Day! May Day! (Quite literally.) It’s May 1st, and the promise of warmer weather is slowing coming to fruition. We’ve had some really nice days here lately and have finally been able to spend some time outside, including multiple picnics with family members. I haven’t moved my swing outside yet- we’ve still had some cool days, so I’m not taking it out of the garage until it’s consistently warm and I can spend my days out there reading, but that day is coming!
This has been a really special month for me, for a lot of reasons, and I’ll get into why in the personal section down below. Reading has also been pretty good for me this month in terms of quality (not numbers, but such is life), and I expect it’ll just keep getting better as my quiet time expands over the summer. Lots of good things right now. 😊
Not a great month in terms of sheer numbers, but I enjoyed most of what I read! Eight of these books came from my TBR. One came off my own shelf. I’m finding it really hard to balance TBR reading with own-shelf reading, but at least I’m trying, right???
I was glad to be done with the Pippi books; I didn’t love them as much as an adult as I did as a kid, which is interesting. The Ramona books held up so well for me (especially since my daughter is definitely a Ramona Quimby!), but as a grown-up, I mostly found Pippi exhausting and *ducks* kind of irritating. I enjoyed but didn’t love the second and third books in the My Side of the Mountain trilogy; they really lacked the charm of the first book. I did walk away with a new respect for peregrine falcons and other birds of prey, so that’s pretty awesome. 😊
Reading Challenge Updates
I’m almost done with my parenting group reading challenge! One more book to go, and I’m waiting for that book to arrive via interlibrary loan.
Only one book read off my own shelves. Still working on this…
State of the Goodreads TBR
Last month, I clocked at 175. This month…176! This seems to hover around the same area no matter what I do. So frustrating, seeing as though I had it down to the 70’s pre-pandemic. Sigh.
Books I Acquired in April 2021
A brief trip to the thrift store yielded The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins and a book of poetry by Robert Frost. I’ve wanted to read The Woman in White for years, ever since a friend recommended it. It’ll probably have to wait until whenever my daughter goes back to school, though, since it’s a pretty big book. Robert Frost has long been my favorite poet. I’ve been trying to read a few poems per day, but that doesn’t always happen. In terms of my daughter’s behavior, it’s been a rough month (insert cringe emoji here).
Bookish Things I Did in April 2021
I was able to attend a virtual presentation that featured Qasim Rashid, a human rights lawyer and author (and purveyor of excellent dad jokes on Twitter!). He was super inspiring and I really enjoyed getting to hear him speak. I was also able to attend a virtual author chat with Brandy Colbert, author of Little & Lion and Pointe. She’s a fabulous author and an absolutely lovely person, and I really enjoyed hearing her thought processes and what went into writing some of her books. She’s got some really interesting books coming up, too, so I’ll be keeping an eye out for that.
Current Podcast Love
It’s been a month of switching podcasts! I listened to some Judaism Unbound, of course; I’ll get back to this soon, as there are some guests on upcoming episodes that I really want to hear. And then I needed something that I didn’t have to think too much about, because when you’re in a lot of pain, all your brain goes toward processing that, and there’s very little left over. So I switched to Stuff You Should Know and have been enjoying Chuck and Josh informing their listeners on all sorts of topics, from dying of fright to hypoallergenic cats to Niagara Falls to lobotomies. I really enjoy the variety of subjects and all the research they put into each episode (which are short, so they’re not overwhelming!).
I’ve also fallen in love with Gotta Grow Up Sometime, a podcast about the short-lived, early 90s early teen soap opera Swans Crossing. The show itself, which featured a young Sarah Michelle Gellar and Mira Sorvino (among other actors and actresses), was over-the-top dramatic and campy, but at age twelve, I utterly adored it, and it’s fun to look at it with adult eyes. The podcast is full-on snark and joyful hilarity, but to be honest, it only makes me love the show more. I’ve been watching a few episodes here and there while I knit (it’s available on TubiTv).
Stephanie’s Read Harder Challenge
On hold until life goes back to normal.
Real Life Stuff
What a month!
It started off still being in a fair amount of pain from my latest flare with my back (which is still ongoing, btw, though not as acute as it was in the beginning). We had an outdoor, masked cookout with family where I spent the majority of the time lying down on a picnic blanket because I couldn’t yet sit upright full-time, though I *did* manage about 50 minutes of sitting time, which felt pretty huge! This was followed by an MRI the next week, which showed that what’s left of my L5S1 disc is herniated, again, and I have less disc and less disc space there since my last MRI in 2018. Fun times.
My son and I were able to get our first Covid-19 vaccines! So many people we know had to travel ridiculously far in the early days of the vaccine distribution, but things are a little better now, and we were able to get our vaccines less than five miles from our house! The pharmacist was super nice and seemed really excited about all the people he’s been able to make happy lately, which I absolutely love. Neither of us had any side effects from our first doses, and we go back mid-May for our next doses. It’ll be a while before life really goes back to normal for us, since my daughter is too young to be vaccinated, but it’s a relief knowing we’re that much closer to being safer.
Speaking of which, my beautiful, snarky, exhausting, wonderful daughter turned 7! Her second birthday in lockdown, which is sad, but I’m happy we have the opportunity to keep her protected. We were able to have family over multiple days for masked-when-necessary, distanced picnics, and she and her cousin masked up and played in the yard for hours, so honestly, her birthday was pretty great. 😊
And now, for my biggest, happiest news…
Following years (decades, really!) of deep contemplation and longing and learning, and over a year of study with multiple rabbis, my conversion to Judaism is complete. I sat for my beit din (rabbinical court) with some amazing people who made me feel welcome and accepted and celebrated, and then it was off to the mikveh, the ritual immersion bath, which is required to complete conversion. The mikveh experience was deeply emotional and beautiful, and I’m brought to tears every time I think about it. I’ve been randomly bursting into tears and grinning like the Cheshire cat ever since. This was truly one of the best days of my life, and I’m looking forward to getting more involved at my synagogue as I’m able. Afterwards, I came home and threw my overnight rise challah into the oven, because Shabbat.
So April was an interesting month, culminating in something truly life-changing and long-awaited for me, and I couldn’t be happier about it. I hope your April was just as lovely, that your books were plentiful and compelling, and that wherever you are, you’re healthy and staying safe. Much love to my readers in India; my heart has been breaking hearing the stories of the devastation Covid is wreaking on your beautiful country. Be safe, my friends.
Onward to May! Happy reading, friends! Enjoy the beautiful May weather, and may your life be filled with sunshine and flowers, good books, love, peace, and the pursuit of justice.
Simple living. It’s not always the simplest way to go, ironically, but it’s something I’ve been engaging in for most of my adult life. Handmade gifts, homecooked food, canning and otherwise preserving, knitting and crocheting and sewing, doing my best to reduce, reuse, and recycle, it’s all a big part of my daily life. I happened upon Rhonda Hetzel’s blog, Down to Earth, a few years ago, and discovered that she had written a book on simple living, also titled Down to Earth(Penguin Australian, 2012). Onto my list it went. It took a bit to get to me via interlibrary loan; Mrs. Hetzel is Australian, and I don’t know how widely known her book is here in the US. My copy came from Virginia, which would probably take most of a day’s driving to get to from where I’m at! Oddly enough, the library in the next town over has another of her books, but not this one. Strange!
If you’re looking to get back to basics, to simplify your life and begin a gentler, more earth-friendly, more soul-nourishing way of living, but you don’t know where to start, Rhonda Hetzel has a plan for you. From the very basics of building a budget that ensures you can cut back and what you can cut out, to building a garden that works for you, and why knitting and sewing and mending is important, to the keeping of chickens, to home cooking and preserving and more, this is an explanation of what simple living looks like at its most fundamental level.
Seasoned homemakers and advocates for this slower way of life may not find anything new here (but inspiration to keep going is always nice, and this lovely book provides that in spades in its gentle encouragement and gorgeous photography), but for neophytes looking to escape the rat race, exhausted working parents barely able to keep up with the daycare costs, folks looking to retire a little early (if possible; here in the US, our lack of a nationalized healthcare system makes this tricky), newlyweds or college graduates just starting out in the real world, all of these people will find a glimpse into a way of navigating life that they may not have considered.
This is an absolutely lovely book- a bit smaller than a traditional coffee table book, more like a small textbook, but it’s filled with beautiful photography of Mrs. Hetzel’s gorgeous life. If you’re looking for a gift for a recent college graduate or a unique bridal shower gift, Down to Earth would make a fabulous choice. Let everyone know that there’s a better way than constantly stopping for fast food and precooked, preservative-filled junk at the store, that even in apartments, your life can be sustainable and earth-friendly.
Down to Earth is a lovely, gentle read about a way of life you may already be engaged in, or something you long for but aren’t sure how to get started. If you’re looking for an overview of all the ways you could slow things down, this is a beautiful place to begin.
A reread! I don’t often reread books, mostly because there are just so many books out there I haven’t read, and I have a limited amount of reading time (especially these days!), so I have to spend it wisely. But my parenting group’s reading challenge this year included a prompt to reread a book by a favorite author. There were so many ways I could have gone with this, but I ended up killing several birds with one stone here by choosing The Red Tent by Anita Diamant (St. Martin’s Press, 1997). It’s a book I’ve already read by an author from whom I’ve read and enjoyed multiple books in the past, it’s a book from my own shelf (woohoo!), and it’s a beautifully written example of modern-day feminist midrash (Ms. Diamant has argued that her story doesn’t count as midrash, but others disagree, and that’s okay! I love seeing the difference of opinion here; it makes my soul so happy!).
The Red Tent is a retelling and an expansion of the biblical story of Dinah, the daughter of Leah and Jacob. Dinah is best known, sadly, for being raped, and little else is said about her. Anita Diamant has reimagined and expanded upon the story of Dinah’s life, painting a vivid picture of what her days were like growing up the only daughter, with four mothers and an entire pack of brothers, and has given her more agency, instead of being seen solely as a victim. The complex relationship between Leah and Rachel features heavily, as does Dinah’s observations of her father and his relationship with each of his wives.
Dinah’s rape is retold as a love story misunderstood by her brothers and father, and the effects of this are massive and widespread. It changes everything about everyone’s lives, and though it isn’t easy and it takes many years, Dinah is able to rebuild her strength and her life, with the help of the strong women she’s lucky to meet and with the gifts she received at the feet of her mothers.
I first read this back around 2008, but to be honest, I didn’t enjoy it as much as I did during this reread. These days, I’m much more familiar with the stories and Biblical characters depicted in this book; I understand the concept of midrash a lot better; I’m a better, deeper reader, more mature in years and more focused than I was during my first read. This has been an excellent example of how we bring so much of who we are to the books we read, and how we read a book and what we get out of it changes as we change. There are some books that I find something new in each time I reread them: The Great Gatsby is one of those; Till the Stars Fall by Kathleen Gilles Seidel is another. I think The Red Tent will have to go on that list as well. I love Ms. Diamant’s ability to recreate Dinah’s world, expanding upon her story while also bringing all the women’s stories, so long ignored or silenced, come to life.
The book was made into a two-part television miniseries that was originally broadcast on the Lifetime Network. If you managed to catch it, I’d love to know what you thought. It appears my library has it on DVD, so I may grab it at one point to watch when my husband and daughter go camping!
I didn’t know that this would end up being such a timely read.
Civil rights are a cause that’s near and dear to my heart. Everyone deserves the full rights of citizenship in the country of their birth or the country they’ve adopted as their own, and the fact that America still hasn’t managed to get it together in this aspect and is actively trying to move backwards is a filthy stain on our collective soul. But there are people out there fighting to right these wrongs (Stacey Abrams, you are an absolute jewel!), and some of them write books about their experiences. When I heard about Race Against Time: A Reporter Reopens the Unsolved Murder Cases of the Civil Rights Era by Jerry Mitchell (Simon & Schuster, 2020), I knew I had to read it. Bless my library for having a copy on their shelves.
During the 1960s, white supremacists decided that their right to feel special was more important than anyone’s civil rights or right to live, so instead of getting some therapy and examining why they felt that way, they decided that murder was the answer. Members of the Ku Klux Klan plotted, planned, and carried out the murders of white and black civil rights workers, along with everyday people- including children- who were just living their lives. And far, far too often, the perpetrators and the planners of these murders walked free, even when they bragged about what they’d done to everyone with functioning eardrums. Even when some of them were Christian clergy. Think about that.
Jerry Mitchell, an investigative journalist working for Mississippi’s Clarion-Ledger, knew that there were plenty of wrongs that needed to be righted, so he set about unlocking the clues to the past. Interviewing family members of the victims, former and current KKK members, and anyone who had anything to do with these cases where justice wasn’t served, he began to help the state piece together legal cases against the alleged killers. It wasn’t easy; so many witnesses had already died, more were suffering from diseases of old age, and the ones who were still full of life made Mr. Mitchell acutely aware that his life was as expendable as those of their earlier victims. But with his well-honed journalist skills and a deep-seated sense of justice and integrity, with well-timed articles that brought crucial and long-buried information to light, Jerry Mitchell aided in the prosecution of some of the dirtiest murderers of the Civil Rights era.
This is really an incredible book. Mr. Mitchell’s dedication is deeply admirable, and his bravery is oftentimes both commendable and shocking. I can’t ever imagine a situation in which I would feel even remotely safe traveling to and going inside Byron de la Beckwith’s house (he was the man who murdered Medgar Evers), but Mr. Mitchell did. He repeatedly made contact with various people whose pasts were infuriating and frightening, who said disgusting things in his presence. Some of them had since reformed and expressed regret over their actions. Many had not, and yet Jerry Mitchell still persevered in order to get the information necessary to pen the articles that would change everything.
He’s quick to point out that he failed more times than he won, that there are still plenty of cold cases where justice was not served and where the families of the victims never received any kind of closure. But the cases he was instrumental in helping bring to court- the murder of Medgar Evers, the murder of the three civil rights workers portrayed in the movie Mississippi Burning, the murder of the four little girls in the 16th Street church bombing, and the murder of civil rights worker Vernon Dahmer- were high-profile, and while individual cases don’t make up for the lack of justice overall, the conviction of these killers is deeply satisfying. Mr. Mitchell tells the story of his work in these cases in a fast-paced read that will keep you racing through the pages in order to learn the final verdicts of each case and how they were reached.
An excellent book, and so timely for today. May we all be Jerry Mitchells in our pursuit of justice, every single day.
She's probably at the library... 