After This, by Alice McDermott

After This is a beautifully written book. It begins and ends in a church, and takes us from the marriage of Mary, a 30-year-old woman, through the birth and growth to adulthood of the four children she has with her husband John. The working-class family lives on Long Island during the middle-to-late decades of the twentieth century, riding out the storms of change in the culture, their lives, and in their church.

Although religion is a big part of their lives, I wouldn't call this a "religious" book. Rather, McDermott shows how the church and the family's beliefs affect - or do not affect - how they live. Mary in particular takes her church's teachings to heart, lighting candles during the two wars she experiences, attending mass regularly, insisting that the children attend Catholic school. We watch, too, as John lies in bed with a slipped disk, thinking of how his life might end, how it might not be as he had imagined, in bed, tended by a priest, but may be as unexpected as falling down dead in the street.

We see segments of each family member's life in vivid color, with light sketches in between phases. Thus we are treated to details of a dinner conversation or a night with a lover and then we may not hear much of that person until he or she is much older. Yet it works. I didn't feel cheated. Many of the moments are deeply moving by themselves, the more so because the moment is not over-labored.

I couldn't help comparing this book to a couple I read recently by Anne Tyler, both of which covered much of the same era in our history. Tyler's books seem, to me, more mocking, more like throwing a veil between the writer and the subjects, while After This is more intimate and touching.

And what is "after this"? From early on I suspected it was "after life". What then? After all that Mary and her family has done and gone through, what then?

The Collected Stories, by Amy Hempel

This book is Amy Hempel’s life work. Of course there is the odd story here and there that did not get in here but essentially this is it. In 404 pages she tells her own story in the form of short fiction, 49 stories in all. Most are shorter than most short fiction, one consisting of just one sentence and another just one page.

In this way, and in the language itself, these stories are much like poetry. All of them distill moments and thoughts economically, making much out of few words. Character is sketched in a phrase, and that’s all that is needed. Because of this depth it may take longer to read these seemingly simple stories than you might expect.

The elements also repeat themselves in a way similar to the film “32 short films about Glenn Gould”. We read about the lover of an artist, an artist who perhaps has many lovers. We hear about time in an institution. We read about dogs and cemeteries. Not once but many times, slid in between lines or used as the whole, layers or whole pies. I am sure that these elements come from Hempel’s real life, although the incidents probably did not happen to her exactly as written. In their way, skewed or direct, they tell us about this writer and the way she sees. It’s a beautifully-written book, full of images and feelings.

The Bastard on the Couch, edited by Daniel Jones

I bought this book because of the subtitle: 27 Men Try Really Hard to Explain Their Feelings About Love, Loss, Fatherhood, and Freedom. I used to read Details magazine for just this thing: men explaining themselves. I don’t think I’ve gotten as much from reading this book as I did from those Details articles, though, and I am not sure why.

The writers in The Bastard on the Couch and those who pen articles for Details have a similar profile: they are generally upwardly mobile, intelligent and intellectual (else why writers?), tend to be thirty-something or forty-something (with a few exceptions), and they are concerned with women. It’s probably the profile of the generation that’s running this world.

There are 27 essays, divided into four sections (parentheses are mine): Hunting and gathering (could be called “the early years”), Can’t be trusted with simple tasks (could be called “housework?”), Bicycles for fish (could be called “making a home”), and All I need (“being without”). As I look over the titles now I can see why they were divided this way, but as I read the book I felt that many can be boiled down to one thing: whining about fairness.

Most of the whining goes this way: I’m a modern man, I want everything to be fair, and so we split everything equally, and this is the thanks I get.

Worst of the whiners lot: The Dog in Me, by Kevin Canty. Kevin goes on endlessly about what the dog in him wants or thinks or does. He holds forth on the subject of how to split the work and the roles in his household and he can’t seem to get past a yearning for “simpler times”, when men were men and…well, you know how that goes.

He says “…we find ourselves scrambling to adapt to new ideas of equality and democracy, to find new roles that seem to make sense….In reason and equality we will proceed together into a new, bright future.” And then: “…But the dog in my can’t help noticing that I’m still paying for everything. The dog in me wonders if this isn’t just a way to make me take care of half of your business while I’m still taking care of all mine”.

In other words, he is using that “dog in me” shtick as a cutesy excuse for justifying his unrelenting and unchanging view of the world. I’ll be damned if I’ll make a real effort to grasp this “equality” thing.

Many of the essays are about that subject: equality. And most portray it the same way: as if men are getting the short end. As if in this new world everything should be split exactly down the middle, no matter how little sense it may make in a particular situation (like pregnancy). Their take on feminism: they tried really hard (look at the subtitle) and tried some more but there’s something wrong with it. It didn’t work the way I wanted so I’m going to do what I want. Or at least think what I want and be resentful about what I’m not getting.

Let’s look at another dog one: The Dog’s Life, by Thomas Lynch. Thomas wails about how he is constantly told that he “just doesn’t get it”. He shrugs and tries for the good-humored aw shucks approach but it fails because of the bitterness. He’s right, they’re wrong, says the subtext, and they just don’t get it.

I don’t doubt that many men have experienced unfairness in their dealings with the “modern women” in their lives. I have boatloads of understanding reserved for men who have been victimized (I really do). Here’s what gets me about the whiners: they generalize. They assume they represent all men and that the women they’ve known are like all women.

In I Am Man, Hear Me Bleat, Fred Leebron distills the basic conflict:

For better or worse, we’re expected to embrace our feminine side and domesticity, to express our feelings, to take care of our children when our wives are working, to do the housework, to cook, to be endlessly patient while our kids scribble on our upholstery and puke over our shoulders. And so we try to do these things, but what husband hasn’t stood in the doorway of the typical scene of domestic tranquility (kids and wife sitting shoulder to shoulder on the carpet, playing “tea” or building with Legos) and wondered – just how the hell do I fit into all this?

When our first child was born, a nurse took me aside. “Don’t try to copy your wife when you handle your child,” she advised. “It will only confuse the baby. Be yourself.”

But I thought this was the era of gender neutrality. I thought we were supposed to pain the girl’s room avocado and the boy’s room mango and give girls trucks and boys dolls. Now, after all that, I’m supposed to figure out how to appropriately manifest my masculinity yet again?

Fred generalized and simplified and therefore did not grasp that so-called “gender neutrality” does not mean we don’t celebrate our honest differences. We are all individuals. More than anything, this is what the women’s movement (which, contrary to most of the opinions in this book, is not over) is really about. Not putting people in boxes and making assumptions about their qualities and abilities based on sex.

In the generalization category, one essay stands out: Why Men Lie (and Always Will), by Vince Passaro. I do not doubt that in Vince’s circle the reasons the men give for lying may seem appropriate responses to female questioning. I’m suspecting, though, based on many men I know and on my own nature, that there are a great many men who would find these reasons just plain ridiculous. It’s a cute essay but don’t look here for insight into most of mankind.

Lest it appear that I am taking too harsh a turn here, I’ll point out that there are some good and even excellent essays in the bunch.

Ward and June R Us, by Rob Spillman, offers a simple, ingenious solution to the fair splitting of household tasks for those who have the flexibility that Rob and his wife have. Father of the Year, by Trey Ellis, is a genuinely affecting story of a man dealing with the loss of the love he thought he had forever. Quarantined Behind Concrete and Steel, by Benjamin LaGuer, speaks eloquently from behind prison walls. She Didn’t Want a S.N.A.G.; She Wanted Me, by Elwood Reid, lets us into the mind of a bouncer with aspirations and the ability to match is “more sensitive” male friends.

Read the book. Sometimes the insights are not on the page; they are what’s left out.

The Worst Hard Time, by Timothy Egan

An extraordinary book about the dust storms on the High Plains in the 1930s. This book takes us into the lives of several people who made up the "nesters" - farmers, along with cowboys, ranchers, doctors, teachers, and newspapermen. We follow the history of the plains from the early twenties, when land was free or cheap and hopes were high, when government policy fed the ambitions of the settlers, on into the 1930s and the worst of the storms.

It is clear from our present perspective that the horrors of the "dust bowl" were man-made. It took a few years and some gutsy thinking people to get that message out during the worst of it and to start the process that would lead to some recovery. Not that these plains have ever fully recovered.

Of particular interest are the extraordinary details. What the storms did to people, animals, buildings, and what happened on the rare occasions when it actually rained. While in the air (which was most of the time) the dust created such static electricity that people were afraid to touch each other. The touch could knock them across a room. The electricity shorted out engines and started fires. The dust destroyed just about everything it touched, killing the natural animal and plant population while bringing in insects that thrived on what was left. Millions of acres of land were left sterile, while the swarms of dust moved into the cities, over other parts of the country, and into the ocean. The storms even reached New York City and Washington, D.C. on occasion.

How the government responded is another fascinating tale, featuring a president who couldn't think of anything to do - Hoover - followed by one who did everything possible - Roosevelt. It's possible that the biggest hero of the time was the person who took on a new governmental position under Roosevelt, Hugh Bennett, and came up with ways to hold the soil down. He didn't stop there, of course. He took his mission to the loners who made up the plains settlers and convinced them that they had to work together to fight this thing.

The story is devastating and often heart-breaking. And so very readable.

What Came Before He Shot Her, by Elizabeth George

I categorized this book as a "mystery" but Elizabeth George is heading into new territory here. Another reviewer calls it a "whydunit", a good description.

George has written several books (all of which I have read) about Thomas Lynley and Barbara Havers of New Scotland Yard and Lynley's close friends and oft-used consultants. The books are written sequentially, and significant events take place in the primary characters' lives. In other words, they do not stand still.

In the book previous to this one, With No One As Witness, Lynley's pregnant wife is shot. She lingers on life support while Lynley decides what to do about the baby inside her. The shooting is apparently random and was done by two young black men, one very young.

What Came Before He Shot Her is the tale of the 12-year-old who found himself facing Helen Lynley with a gun. The story starts, as the title suggests, well before the act and explains what circumstances led him there.

The story follows his family, a struggling group that consists of Joel, the 12-year-old, Toby, his eight-year-old brother, who is "not right", Vanessa, Joel's older sister, and their Aunt Kendra. The children have survived horrific experiences on the streets of London and in their homes. They have learned the ways of the street and the wisdom of keeping their own counsel. It isn't safe to "grass" on another, no matter how much trouble that other causes.

And so it is that Joel, in a desperate effort to protect his little brother from another boy who has threatened him, heads down a path that gets darker and darker. And so it is that he cannot tell anyone what he is doing.

The bones of the story are clear enough. What really places George in a different category is that she rounds everything out, adds the details and experiences that make the characters truly lifelike and sympathetic.

She devotes much of all of her novels to details that have no bearing on the final outcome, the discovery of the criminal. But over time, over several books, the details add up. So it is with this story. All of the family members have a life and a story to live. We follow each one as he or she tries to make a way in the world. We also follow the efforts of some governmental and private individuals who can see past the obvious and find real people, worth helping, in this family unit. In the end we see what looks like failure, but I'm sure it doesn't end there.

I can't wait to get my hands on the next chapter.

The Dream Life of Sukhanov, by Olga Grushin

The Dream Life of Sukhanov is a rare, beautifully-written book that explores a fundamental theme: where the choices we make in our lives take us.

Sukhanov, a 56-year-old art critic in Moscow in the mid-1980s, who long ago "sold out" to have a peaceful, comfortable life in a country that does not respect true art, begins to find that his walled-off past is starting to invade the present. Little by little, triggered by incidents in the present day, he faces the choices he has made over the years. The wall does not come tumbling down neatly, brick by brick, but rather like it has sprung occasional leaks. Sukhanov races to repair the damage again and again, reasserting his stuffy, arrogant self each time.

The attacks from his past come in the form of dreams, both while he sleeps and when he is awake, and without warning. The drifting into dreams become more frequent, and we begin to enter Sukhanov's mind ourselves, as the third-person narrative increasingly slides into the first.

While the dreams threaten to take over, the present does not stop trotting along, plunging Sukhanov into a world he had for so long tried to avoid. Assailed from the present as well as the past, Sukhanov eventually finds escape.

In addition to exploring Sukhanov's personal demons, Grushin brings us into the world of art, particularly surrealist and impressionist art. As other reviewers have noted, the writing itself is often impressionistic and nearly surreal. Just as the great impressionist painters were able to bring their visions to a diverse audience, so is Grushin able to paint so that we understand, and at the same time we sometimes gasp with wonder.

The Mouse That Roared, by Henry Giroux

I would have been able to read this little book in one or two days if it had been written in English. It is written in a sociological jargon, heavy with repetition. It's possible to open any page and find writing like this:

...Disney's view of innocence had to be constructed within particular maps of meaning in which children and adults could define themselves through a cultural language that offers them both modest pleasure and a coherent sense of identity. This suggested that Disney define innocence as part of the logic of home entertainment and also, pedagogically, as a set of values and practices that associate the safeguarding of childhood with a strong investment in the status quo and in the market as a sphere of consumption.

Or how about this:

Pedagogically, this suggests the need for educators, parents and others to analyze critically how the privileged dominant readings of Disney's animated films generate and affirm particular pleasures, desires, and subject positions that define for children specific notions of agency and its possibilities in society.

Frankly, this book is not well-written, which is a shame because it takes on an important topic. The dramatic title suggests that we are to be treated to a definitive analysis in plain language, but instead we get what reads more like a college term paper (I notice that the title is very similar to one of the magazine articles cited in the book; it's therefore not even particularly original).

The overuse of these words tip us off that the writer has bought the idea that jargon somehow adds meaning: “text” and “narrative”, as in “The Disney text” or the “Disney narrative”, “maps of meaning”, “discourse”, "pedagogical" (two particular favorites) and “public memory”. Throughout the book Giroux refers to "culture workers" without once defining the term, and takes time to define "pedagogy" in a late chapter, after having used it in almost every paragraph up to then. The author also makes frequent use of source material that is no more than the opinions of others, a trick typically used in term paper writing.

The oft-repeated theme of the book, that the Disney corporation's products educate our children to become consumers who are malleable, unpolitical and who accept an idealized view of the past, is an important one. Yet repetition in the muddied sociological language Giroux uses does not provide the emphasis or clarity needed. Nor does Giroux back up his charges with real examples most of the time. Perhaps the most interesting part of the book is the dissection of two Disney-funded films: Pretty Woman and Good Morning Vietnam. In these analyses we can actually see how the films represent specific viewpoints and ignore reality.

The last chapter outlines general suggestions for countering the effects on our culture of Disney and other large corporations. These suggestions are on the order of staging protests or writing letters to congress. There isn't a single suggestion that goes beyond a fuzzy feeling. I am not one who insists that everyone who points out a problem should be required to offer stunning solutions. But if you go there, take it seriously. I don't think Giroux does that.

Because the book was so wrapped in the fur of jargon, I found it very difficult to take away specific concerns in such a way that I could repeat them myself. An important topic, poorly presented.

2-1/2 out of 5 stars